Fromage - The Darker Side of Schloeffelonia

Chapter 43 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:19:00 +0000

XLIII

The winter passed in Schloeffelonia like a storm that, though long during the experience, once it was over seemed to be only a brief moment in recollection. There were moments of insurrection: most accountably the mutiny of he who could have been his greatest rival aside from Sangwine, le Duc du Fromage. Of this Fang was disappointed, for he had assumed le Duc would have more sense, but what he didn’t realize was that his support had fractured and that the noble houses had discovered through experience that a long war was not only draining the life from their country, but affecting them personally as well. It is when the lofty are affected personally that they deign to incite change, and so le Duc had begun organizing a sort of resistance. Fortunately for Fang, he had always kept eyes upon le Duc for such a thing, and caught it before it had a chance to come to any fruition. It was serendipitous, really, because le Duc gave him the perfect excuse to dispose of him and claim his fortune, which was a boon to the empire’s efforts.

At the disposal of le Duc, la Duchesse had become a raving lunatic. It appeared to Fang, who had her detained and brought to him, that she had lost her mind. Perhaps it had happened long ago, for she seemed to have no cognizance of either of her children, or of anything that made any sense at all. She raved about le Duc on occasion in her madness, but regarding inquiries, she either didn’t hear them, or could not reply. In fact, Fang found la Duchesse du Fromage so maniacally disturbing that he let her go, and the guard watched her as she fled Schloeffelonia as one who cannot stand to be in the presence of something that brings great anxiety. Nothing more was heard of la Duchesse.

He had spared no expense in the care of Camilla, though her seclusion was continually forced. She was a prisoner, though one served by several entirely deaf attendants, and she was made to live high in the tower, watching Schloeffelonia from above.

It appeared to Fang as if all of the Fromages had proven to be entirely untrustworthy in the face of even the smallest amount of inconvenience, and of none was he more disappointed than Al’bert. It was Al’bert who he sent on the very plain, simple task of finishing his last blood relative, and Al’bert had failed so prodigiously and for such an extendedly long period of time that Fang could think nothing but that Al’bert had fallen into paths of insurrection of his own. He knew Al’bert and he knew what Al’bert was capable of. Al’bert hadn’t failed. He had refused, but in a way that pointedly avoided any sort of confrontation. Fang had never known Al’bert was a coward, but now that he did, he could hardly stand to think about him. He would have to be recalled, and Sangwine would have to be killed elsewise. What he would do with Al’bert was a matter of great anxiety for Fang.

Zedwig had distanced himself from Fang since the day in the stairwell, although he was still amicable in a working fashion, but he had clearly drawn a line between himself and Fang which Fang was simply not allowed to cross. It became more and more unclear to him and to Zedwig which of them was in control of their combined subconscious, for though Fang always retained the ability to force Zedwig to comply to his wishes, he never used it, and in fact hadn’t used it since they had attacked the City of Ena. Why he hadn’t used it, he wasn’t entirely sure. There are things he would have liked to force Zedwig to do, but then again he couldn’t stand the idea of forcing him to do anything. He believed this was a side effect of love, but having no past experience to draw from, he was entirely unsure. He wondered if, when it became absolutely necessary for him to wield Zedwig’s power through force, he would be able to do it.

In the case of the war, Fang was losing his drive. He knew this to be a direct influence from Zedwig, and in one sense it irritated him to the point of anger, and in another he wanted to embrace these newfound shadows of pacifism. His empire already stretched through half the known world, and perhaps, should he end the war after this winter, he could embroil himself in the occupation of managing all of these lands. It struck him as ironic that, after his abrasive youth, he would at last settle into a life of politics and perhaps even be quite comfortable in doing so.

He wondered if he could transform Schloeffelonia into a hub of trade; a vast, diverse metropolis through which all passed as it held the position of being the thriving, beating heart of the elven empire. No longer would it be a secluded, secretive land wherein other races fear to set foot, but it would be peopled with all types, of all walks of life, and around it the great spokes and wheel that made up the rest of the empire would revolve. Fang could envision it, and then he would discuss these things expressing great animation and delight with Zedwig.

For the mage, Fang’s concepts were bizarre and radical and he could hardly imagine such a thing to function properly, let alone exist. Zedwig did, however, always listen, and it seemed, slowly, that they had fallen into old themes once left behind: He was the mentor, and Fangline was his eager student. It was even possible from time to time to forget that Fang was the cruel force he had shown himself to be in the past, as, being in Schloeffelonia, sleeping deep in the winter snows, most of Fang’s work was administrative and slow. There were afternoons spent near the large windows that stretched from floor to ceiling, when they would sit and discuss the world in the warmth of afternoon sunlight, and every day Fang seemed to fall further and further away from war, and ever closer to peace. This hope kept Zedwig going, and also his health was failing with great rapidity and he knew he wouldn’t have very long to wait.

There were many days when Fang would lean forward in his chair, rest his elbows wearily upon his knees and passionately declare his angst over Zedwig’s state, and Zedwig would listen, all the while knowing secretly to himself that should the time come that he was capable of removing himself from Fang he would take it, and even more deeply knowing the only way he could accomplish that was through death.

But while looking at Fangline and considering his form and intellect, and his education combined with his vast abilities and intense work ethic, Zedwig very often felt a deep, searing sorrow for what he might have been. Only in recent months had he begun to observe Fang changing into something new other than the basic, primal forces that once ruled him, and he knew his suspicions were right; if things had gone differently, Fang could have been the greatest king ever to rule Schloeffelonia. His ideas were brilliant, if perhaps on the overly progressive side, and he was a wealth of energy and creativity. Instead, though, and quite tragically, he would only hold the distinction of being the most terrifying king Schloeffelonia ever had, and fathers would warn their sons throughout eons of remembrance not to be like Fangline the Terrible.

Still, the long silent winter passed, untouchable, deep in snow, and filled with quiet moments they each spent in the other’s company, even blithely at times, for they were all that they possessed of value in the world.

THE END[1]

[1] Here the timeline ends just previous to page #281 in the comic, where the story continues.

Chapter 42 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:19:00 +0000

XLII

The march back to Schloeffelonia was a rapid one, as the army was anxious to get through the canyon before snow rendered it impassable. They did make it, though just by a day or two, as heavy snows nearly kept the war wagons in the possession of the mountains, and only by luck a warm afternoon stopped the grasping, cold hands of canyon snow long enough for them to escape.

The mage was never out of the sight of the overlord, who guarded him and his health with a jealous possessiveness bordering on fury that everyone quickly learned not to arouse, and it wasn’t until they finally began the descent from the mountains into the valley of Schloeffelonia that Fang became less like a coiled spring ready to strike and more composed like his former self.

The castle came into view, lovely, comforting, and conflicting. For Fang this was home, but he hated it and loved it in a way that would never come to terms with itself. Still, after a very long campaign, being home was a distinct pleasure.

It was quiet, and Fang had sent the bulk of the army away to the barracks, removed and beyond a hill from the castle proper. Regnar stayed with him, as always, walking with a large polearm like a staff, and Zedwig, feeling better than usual today, rode beside him. As the sunlight passed through the Schloeffelonian branches above him and played across his face, and as the cool alpine breeze carried with it the scent of sage, Fang felt one of the closest things to happiness than he had for a very long time, and wondered if there was something about his homeland that he did not realize he had always taken for granted. It was at this moment that things began to go wrong.

They approached the castle, and as they did, Camilla emerged, strangely, and behind her was the palace guard. All of them, Fang realized, from the looks of it. They were in the posture of guarding her zealously, and as Fang dismounted and turned his mind in an attempt to discern what exactly was going on, she approached him, her features looking very distant and cold. He couldn’t help musing over how it suited her mysterious beauty to behave like this, even as he wondered what she was about.

“You’re certainly not behaving like a prisoner,” Fang said to her.

“That’s because I’m not one,” she replied. “Not anymore.”

“Then what are you?”

“I’m in charge, actually,” she said, and then her voice filled with silken timbre and she addressed the guards who had come with Fang. “You take orders from me, now.”

Following this, the guards shifted, and began to lose coherence. “Come along, then,” she told them, and they fell in with her. Fang watched her, watched the guards, and found it all oddly bemusing.

“What do you mean to accomplish, Camilla?” he asked her.

“I mean to end this war,” she told him. “Our country was never meant to be an empire. You’re exhausting our strength with your fancies of conquest, and we will not endure it any longer.”

“And so you’re going to take control of Schloeffelonia from me with your voice?”

“I believe I already have,” she replied.

He could feel Zedwig shift; slightly brushing his arm, and Camilla regarded the mage.

“You have not,” said Fang. “Zedwig can kill all of these men before you can voice your next order.”

Her brow furrowed and she glanced at Fang.

“Come with me,” she compelled Zedwig, whose mind, it was immediately apparent, could not be shifted from its solid attachment to Fang’s.

“No Comtesse,” he told her mildly. “It is useless to try, although you’ve made an admirable effort.”

Zedwig truly did look sympathetic towards Camilla, whose face began to reflect outrage and fear.

“Will you condemn all of these men to death, and become my prisoner again?” Fang asked her. “Or will you come quietly and let them live?”

Something snapped within Camilla, and she rushed at Fang, physically attacking him in her fury.

“Curse you, Fangline!” she cried. “For what you have done to the world, to our country!”

He subdued her, held her, grasped her wrists, and she struggled in her desire to hurt him. She turned her fury onto Zedwig.

“How can you help him!” she demanded of Zedwig. “He destroys everything! There is nothing he loves!”

At this, she began to cry, and he heard Zedwig draw a breath and turned to watch him look away.

“Release them,” Fang told her.

“I want to see Al’bert again,” she said, weeping.

“Release them, Camilla.”

She cried for a moment, and then said brokenly, “You are released.” At the sound of her voice, the guards appeared startled, and they all, regaining will, tried to surmise how they had come to be in this situation. Some glared at Camilla, and some regarded her with fear.

“Regnar,” called Fang, to which the guard, looking very ashamed, approached Fang with intense penitence. “Find a deaf man who can follow instructions.”

“Yes, your worship,” he bowed, and immediately began sending guards in every direction in a flurry of compliance.

Within Fang’s grip was still Camilla, who was weakly sobbing and occasionally muttering about her brother. He considered her, and truly didn’t like her proud beauty reduced to such incoherence.

“Camilla,” he told her quietly. “Pull yourself together.”

She caught her breath twice, in the way of sad hysteria, and said, “My father will stop you.”

“No, he will not,” replied Fang, and began to pull her with him into the castle. Zedwig followed as Fang began to lecture her. “There is no possibility that your father could do anything but kill himself challenging me, and if he is a smart man, which I have faith he is, he won’t try. You, Camilla, are a Comtesse, and are behaving like an injured schoolgirl. It doesn’t become you, and your beauty and station requires far better of you.”

“You are killing our country!”

His grip tightened on her wrist as he pulled her down the cool, shaded stone hallway. “I am not. I am making it stronger!”

“If you think what you are doing is for the good of Schloefflonia, then you are a fool, Fangline!”

He stopped and faced her at this, and her back was against the corner of the hallway and an opening that led to a great, narrow, winding stairway of stone. Her eyes were full of defiance, as if she was resigned to whatever her fate might be and had lost all hesitation in speaking freely.

“To think of all the time I knew you, I could never know that you would become this. I used to think great things of you. I even loved you, Fangline, and I have never loved anyone but Al’bert! But now… how could this have happened to you? How could you be what you are? I can not stand what you are!”

“I am the most powerful man in the world,” he informed her.

“What does that matter,” she cried, looking away from his face.

He hated her condemnation and pulled her up the stairway, down another hallway, higher and higher within the castle to the top of a vastly high spinet where there was a circular room with a window. He thrust her inside, and she allowed herself to be left there in the middle of the room while he lingered at the arched doorway.

“The only reason you aren’t dead is because I once loved you, too,” he told her, and then bolted the door.

He stayed there for a long moment, flushed, his mind racing, his back to the door, and wondering why he would have said that to her. Zedwig observed him carefully, quietly, and from a sufficient distance to keep him from feeling cornered in his emotions.

“Oh depths, did I love her?” he whispered to himself and to Zedwig and to the stairwell, which wound twistedly downwards in shadow. He saw another pathway in which his life might have gone, one where he became king in the way he had been expected, and in which Camilla was his proud, beautiful queen. It seemed compellingly simpler in the way memories of times past or fantasies always appear, without the persistent nagging details and complications that are always in the present. The thought briefly shot through him to open the door and go back inside, for her. Zedwig only watched him, still with his back against the wall, his weight balanced between two steps.

“But what does it matter, now?” he sighed, his voice lacking hope. “What difference would it make?”

Zedwig shifted and raised a step, closer to him. Fang closed his eyes, feeling an agony he never knew he would, and said, “She despises me.”

He opened his eyes to find Zedwig was near and he focused upon the mage. “And you despise me, as well.”

Zedwig’s amethyst eyes shifted away, then back. “No, Fangline,” he admitted. “I don’t.”

Something hung in the air, and there was silence between them for a time.

Zedwig continued almost too quietly to hear in the silent stone stairwell. “But I once did.”

Fang reached for Zedwig with one arm, pulled him and kissed his temple softly. “Why don’t you?” he whispered, holding him near.

“It’s what I always feared, from the beginning,” said Zedwig quietly. “That, should I allow myself to get too close to you, I would grow so attached I would not be able to pull away again. I suspect…” and he paused as if searching for a way to put the vague, soft concepts of the mind into strict blocks of words. “It was the same for Camilla, or even for Al’bert. You are a compelling person, Fangline, and horrible, and brilliant… and… an enigma.”

Zedwig sighed and Fang brought his other hand to the mage’s arm. “I suspect she still loves you,” said Zedwig. “Perhaps she always will. Perhaps it is drawn up in what you are: a magnifier. Maybe that is what makes those who love you, love you to the point of morbid fascination, to their own detriment, to the detriment of those around them,” and the last he whispered, “To do things they never imagined they would.”

“She tried to take Schloeffelonia from me,” Fang objected.

“Did you not see what was on her face when she saw you, Fangline?”

He looked down into Zedwig’s face, as Zedwig was a step below him and their height was no longer equal. “I saw nothing.”

“She thrilled to see you again, I saw it plainly, and, should you have relinquished control to her, she likely would have given it back if you had asked for it.” Zedwig gripped his sleeve. “She attacked you because of her frustration, partly because she hated to lose, but partly because she wanted you, and you are wholly inaccessible to her.”

Fang stared at Zedwig. “How did you perceive all of this?”

“I- I don’t know. I just did.”

“I thought that was supposed to be my forte, and yet, here I am clueless while you noticed every nuance. Are you…” and Fang paused briefly. “Are you …?”

He merely stopped, unable to consider this sort of thing, because it scared him. “No, I can’t possibly,” said Zedwig of it.

“You’re not taking my ability… are you?”

“No, it can’t be, unless…”

“Unless what?”

“Unless when I draw power from you, I somehow absorb it, but it would most likely be only temporary, or a lingering effect.”

“But what if…” Fang began slowly. “You were to eventually absorb all of my ability? I would no longer be able to control you, or even use this artifact. I would be entirely at your mercy, Zedwig.”

“You would,” replied Zedwig.

Fang looked into his eyes and tried to discover what would happen, and what Zedwig would do, and in a sense, he felt as if he were already at the mercy of Zedwig. This was why he had never allowed himself to belong to anyone, ever, because he knew, somehow, if he showed any level of vulnerability to anyone that this would happen. He could hardly stand it, but at the same time he longed to be able to release Zedwig if it didn’t mean that he would lose him. Zedwig perceived all of this, it seemed, because he pulled him downward and pressed Fang’s forehead against his own.

Here, held by Zedwig, Fang could not steady his breathing, regardless of the calming sound of the mage’s voice. “I have been at your mercy for some years, now, Fangline,” he said. “You have been cruel and horrible, and I have seen and done things under your control that caused me suffering beyond anything I had ever imagined previously.” He went on, his hands touching Fang’s face gently. “I hated you, I loathed you and everything you did and made me do, but above all I wondered what I had done to deserve this abject misery and horror. My students have died; I have killed my friends, and all because of you. I have used that which I love above all other things, magic, to kill, maim, and destroy. You used me, and worse yet, you seemed to get a perverse pleasure from ruining me and seeing me do what I would never have done unless compelled by your force.” The tip of Zedwig’s nose brushed his cheek and he whispered, “You have taken everything from me, everything, and in so doing, you left me with only one thing… you. And then one day, I understood you. I knew you, and, most importantly, I knew why. And now… there is only one thing in the world that I can completely understand, and that is you.”

Fang pulled away, and Zedwig only looked into his face and continued. “But how tragic it is, Fangline. Should I have left like I did, fearing you and my attachment to you when I taught you long ago? If I had stayed, and had come to understand you completely back then, would I only delay the inevitable, or could I have changed all of this?” He pulled Fang and said as if rhetorical and begging for answers at the same time, “Could I have changed you?”

“Yes, Zedwig,” replied Fang. “You have changed me.”

“But I am too late,” said Zedwig, and the sorrow on his face grew.

Fang was struck with the sudden impulsive desire to kiss his face, because it seemed everything Zedwig said or did drew him in some way he couldn’t define. He loved him; he loved him, he realized, and it changed his soul like a tightly closed fist that opens in relief, or like a curled and shrunken dormant flower whose petals unfurl and spread at daylight, drinking thirstily from the light that shines upon it. He loved him though he had never loved his father, or his brother, or any other man he had ever known and it was a vast sea of boundless and uncharted waters; it had always been there, perhaps forever, but never realized, and it possessed a depth that surpassed any love he might have felt for Camilla, and it was impossible for him to imagine anything more consuming than the despairing urgency that he now suffered with this knowledge.

Nearly as quickly as Fang realized it, Zedwig perceived it as well, as if it were a warm, spreading hue that filtered across the colors which made Fangline, and once it had spread through him, he would never be the same. He was changed forever. Zedwig’s eyes widened and he drew back, and he caught his breath. The mage said nothing, but turned and left, descending the stairs and leaving the presence of Fang for the first time in weeks.

As for Fang, he didn’t know whether despair or exuberance was in order, he didn’t know whether he wanted to die or live, but he began to realize, at last, that power wasn’t everything and that life was possibly far more multifaceted and brilliant than he had ever suspected.

Chapter 41 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:18:00 +0000

XLI

Fang woke slowly, darkly, and thickly, like a tangible fog held him close and would rather not let him return to the world. His consciousness wavered in and out between dreams and life and he lingered for a very long time on the edge of waking, hearing that which occurred around him, but not able to muster the last bit of strength required to move or to open his eyes. He heard movement, the occasional voice of a guard, and the voices of Regnar and Zedwig intermingling: one low and staccato, the other tenor and silken, and it was this latter voice that kept Fang from drifting back into the fog, but made him fight for full consciousness.

Even so it took him some time to manage it, and by the time he opened his eyes there was no conversation at all and the world was dark and dampened with night and snow. Within his tent there was no lamp or candle lit, but in the darkness he could see Zedwig asleep above him in a chair. There was no one else within, but he heard a guard shift outside. He stared at the ceiling of his tent for a long while, thinking.

Eventually, perhaps an hour later, moving didn’t seem quite so difficult, and he rose, sitting up and regarding Zedwig’s still form on the chair. His head was resting in his palm, his hair was in disarray, and his chest rose and fell with regular solidarity. He looked tired, even while sleeping, and his position appeared to Fang to be extraordinarily uncomfortable.

Rising to his knees, he touched the arm of the chair and moved closer to Zedwig, if for nothing else, then to take advantage of the opportunity to study him in unabashed detail. In the things he had heard while sleeping, and from where he was placed, and from the bearing of all things presently, Fang intuitively concluded that it had been Zedwig who ran the empire in his absence, and this caused the overlord to wonder at him, and why he should show such loyalty to Fang when he was finally defenseless. If nothing else, he could have simply done his own work and left whatever Fang usually did to molder. But, he did not.

Fang touched Zedwig’s hair; brushing a silver lock gone astray into place in a gesture that was more affectionate than necessary and Zedwig woke with a start, his face rising from his hand and his mind instantly cognizant of his surroundings. His eyes immediately found Fang’s and he said:

“Fangline, you’re awake.”

“How long did I sleep?”

“Two days,” Zedwig replied, and Fang’s mind immediately scattered with the possibilities of how much could go wrong in two days without his guidance. Zedwig perceived his stress and put a hand on his shoulder. “We left for the canyon two days ago, as the snows have continued, though it isn’t a heavy snow… not yet. I placed a small force in the City of Ena, though I doubt there will be any rebellion, and most likely the troops will have to help rebuild rather than enforce any sort of order.” Fang looked at him and neither one of them felt like broaching the subject yet of what they had experienced during the attack. “The first day was without incident, and today, though more snow has fallen, it hasn’t grown heavy enough to stick. We should reach the canyon tomorrow. We lost another mage.” The last was almost an afterthought, a sordid afterthought Zedwig only glossed over to say it and have it done with.

Fang replied to the last, though uncharacteristically. “I’m sorry,” he said to Zedwig regarding his past student and in a consolation that held no personal accountability. Perhaps it was that Fang only believed he was doing what he must, and thus felt no remorse when others died due to his actions, but, for some reason, Fang’s conscience was scarcely pricked when it came to the things he did. He did, however, feel empathy towards Zedwig and his loss, and as he spoke the words that had always been spoken to mourners to the mage he touched his face, then slid his palm across the smooth roundness of his cheek and then, in a rush of sudden motion, they embraced.

Zedwig clung to him, and he clung to the mage equally, in frustration and unhappiness, as they were fully aware that they were two sides of a coin that could never be reconciled.

“It can never happen again,” Fang felt Zedwig whisper against his neck. “It can’t… it can’t. What have you done to me?”

He pulled Zedwig with the need for more and more of the embrace between them, and as he struggled with this, he knew they had both, through compromise, shifted from black and white to shades of gray. Zedwig made a quiet noise, and Fang pulled back, looked into his face and saw for the first time his exhaustion and his sickness had returned with furor, and he whispered, “You’re so sick…”

“Yes, and I’m going to die,” he said to Fang as simply as discussing the falling snow outside. Fang began to reply, but Zedwig stopped him gently, speaking before he could. “I need to die, Fangline. Can’t you see that we cannot both exist in this world? Combined we are far too powerful; the balance is all wrong. You were right: together there is nothing that can stand before us. We could destroy the world if we wanted, and bend it to our will. We could make everyone and everything bow before us. Our power would be great… how great it would be, but how horrible. It is wrong… it is all … wrong… and I don’t know how much longer I can force myself to stay away from it.”

Zedwig drew a trembling breath and continued, “It’s what you wanted all along, for me to see what we are capable of and to want it, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Fang whispered.

“That’s why I have to die.”

“I won’t let you.”

“You don’t have a choice.”

“I’ll find another healer.”

“I used all we found on the other mages.”

“Curse you, Zedwig!” Fang erupted, and stood, moving away. He hated Zedwig with a blind fury at this moment, and couldn’t seem to regain his breath no matter how he tried. A guard looked in at the entrance to be certain all was well inside, but quickly ducked away as surreptitiously as possible. It didn’t matter; the only thing Fang was cognizant of was his own roiling thoughts. “I will send riders in all directions to find one! You will not die, Zedwig, no matter how badly you want death, I will not allow it!”

Zedwig merely sat silently in his chair and watched Fang’s tirade with little or no reaction upon his features. “And then, when I am healed, what will occur?” he said to Fang, a calm sadness around him. “Will I never use this power again? Could you live with that? Or will the same thing that has happened over and over happen again?” He leaned forward slightly in his chair. “Could you stand near me, day after day, and never use it?”

Fang couldn’t respond, and after a long moment Zedwig said quietly, “I don’t think I could either, not now, not since…” He trailed off as if unable to discuss it. Fang’s fury was spent, and as ardency rushed in to fill the vacuum, he moved to Zedwig, lifted the mage’s hands to his face and kissed them, again and again. Then he pulled him from the chair, laid him upon his pallet, and asked him to sleep.

“I am going to discover the state of things,” he said quietly as he knelt over him. “Surely there is work enough to do until sunrise, and I’ve no more need for sleep. You, if I can manage it, will rest until we get home, and then until we procure a healer. You will not die.” His brushed Zedwig’ hairline with his fingers, and his voice broke as he said, “You can not die.”

Zedwig looked away from Fang to the space beyond him and did not reply.

Chapter 40 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:18:00 +0000

Zedwig forced himself to believe that cooperating with Fang was the right thing to do. As he did so, Fang changed, and a rather large number of lives were saved. This would have given Zedwig some gratification if he could have stopped wondering if there were some way for him to remove himself entirely from Fang’s grasp. Even worse, he began to wonder if he could ever be removed entirely from Fang’s grasp, artifact or not.

It had been two years that he had been compelled by Fang, during which time he had grown accustomed to it. He never liked it, not exactly, but he knew that he was allowed to see something in Fang that very few, if any, had ever seen. It was perhaps only through consequence that he knew Fang as he did; if he hadn’t been such a rarely intuitive mage, or if Fang hadn’t been born a magnifier, none of this would ever have happened. Fang wouldn’t have conquered half of the known world using him as a weapon, and Schloeffelonia would still be whole.

He supposed Schloeffelonia was still whole, per se, but it certainly wasn’t what it once was. It stood for nothing that it once did, and had become something to fear in the world, instead of the quiet enigma it used to be.

If Fang hadn’t been the madman Zedwig was convinced he was, they very likely would have been very close lifelong friends, for how rare was the gift they had with each other and how singular it is for an individual to be entirely understood by another. As well as Fang had never experienced that sort of closeness with anyone in his life, neither had Zedwig, who had been plagued by his shyness from a young age. The anomaly was very nearly thrust upon them, but was also something they both craved once they had tasted it, and whether or not they could truly tolerate being separated was questionable, indeed.

It is true that Zedwig was miserable in his suffering and had in fact suffered beyond what nearly all mortals ever had. If it hadn’t been for that which Gaffer gave him, he would have been lost. But, strangely, despite his hatred towards the madness of the overlord actions, the appalling, disgusting nature of Fang’s lust for violence, and Fang’s vice-like grip over him, he had been Zedwig’s sole companion. As is the way of mortal suffering, there was only so long before Zedwig began to make the most of the hand he held. He hated him, he needed him, he understood him, and perceived him to be a great tragedy.

Today they rode across the plains towards the City of Ena. It was at times like this Zedwig felt he could forget the heavy burdens around this moment and merely live. The grass moved and swirled around the feet of soldiers to either side, making a light, soft noise that mixed gently with the sound of armor and distant wagons. He was aware, always aware, of Fang beside him and despite himself, preferred his proximity.

He glanced at the overlord, who perceived him and caught his eye, then rode his horse closer to Zedwig’s.

“We should be there by nightfall,” Fang told him. Zedwig gripped the reins, feeling the leather straps through his gloves. It had grown colder of late, and very soon the snows would begin to fall. Judging from the look of the sky, Zedwig suspected it might happen tonight. They would have to move quickly to get through the canyon in the west before the snows prevented all passage back to Schloeffelonia. The cold had come early, this year.

“When do you plan on attacking?” Zedwig asked.

“Immediately,” replied Fang.

Zedwig considered that, and then drew a breath.

“Fangline…”

“What is it,” said Fang, who was gazing at the horizon and didn’t look as if he wanted to hear what was coming.

“What of negotiations?”

“We sent word, and they replied poorly,” said Fang in a clipped manner, hardly explaining at all. Zedwig didn’t press that particular issue, but went on to a different tactic.

“I’ve been thinking, Fangline,” he said. “That perhaps a few fireballs in warning would be enough to initiate surrender.”

“Perhaps,” said Fang, who waxed moody.

Zedwig gripped his reigns more tightly.

The City of Ena was set on the first slopes that marked the entrance to a winding canyon that passed through the eastern mountain range, and was the largest city in the east excepting Kazaad’sandish, which was sprawling where this one was compact and all laid within a white, circular stone wall. The entire city sloped along the length of one mountain and held within it a beautiful statue that was the city’s namesake. It was of an ancient witch who had wielded fire, and hardly anyone knew the legend anymore, but they did know that the word “ena” had once meant “fire” and that the statue was regarded as a fine work of art in a world where that sort of thing was unusually rare.

As the army approached night had fallen and even a light snow had begun to fall. Zedwig watched as snowflake after snowflake fell upon Fang’s burning shoulder, to immediately melt to nothing. He wondered how little he could get away with doing, tonight.

Fang turned to him.

“It’s time to begin,” said the overlord.

“How shall we do it?” Zedwig asked, pointedly ignoring the fact that “it” involved blowing things up.

Fang shifted his weight, appearing conflicted, and moved closer to Zedwig, as in the manner of private confidence.

“I wonder, Zedwig,” he said to him alone. “Will this be our last battle?”

“Perhaps,” Zedwig replied, disallowing any emotion to enter his voice. He should not feel any regret over this part of his life coming to an end and in fact he badly hoped this was his last battle, hoped for it dearly, but the destructive magic was not without its effects, and one of those was the surface pleasure he received from wielding such great power in conjunction with Fang. He knew this was prevalent on Fang’s mind as he came to stand very near him and faced the city.

“Let’s begin with a few,” he said. “Call the other mages.”

Zedwig did as he was ordered, and began drawing magic, drawing only modestly from Fang for he loathed the part of himself that enjoyed it. He could feel Fang waiting in anticipation for more, but he wouldn’t do it; not now, and partly because he didn’t want to admit to himself he wanted it. The other mages came to form a double line of wide spaces behind them, although there were not many left, and in fact there were less than ten. Zedwig ordered them in his mind and they stood ready, absorbing the magic around them, each emptying the life force of the space he occupied, and drawing from other unknowing wells, such as the soldiers, or the earth. Their absorption was wan and faint, though, compared to his mastery over the forces around him, like a group of violin students might play the scarcely melodious sound of a child compared to the master, who sounds the bow across the strings with a confident, resonant vibration.

He became one with the forces around him again, a feeling which helped him forget and which gave him serenity in a sense. All time slipped away, and so did objects and details, as he became fully focused and allowed his senses to rule him. Beside him Fang shifted, a flaming torch of force, and he could feel him brush physically against him, but only once, which caused Zedwig to desire for his return and for so much power to be closer and more immediate. The space between them became a gulf, though it was only inches, and Fang sensed his longing and, like feedback or an endless loop, it fed on itself between them until he was touching him again though neither could tell which of them had made it happen. It simply was, inevitably, and as he felt Fang beside him the raw power which coursed within him made him see differently; the white wall surrounding the city before him was laced with light and power and red which clouded his sight, threatening to surrender to the rest of his senses, the last of which being a sixth sense overwhelming all others and craving access to more and more power. He fought for coherence.

“Where shall I aim?” he asked Fang, and although his voice broke and his breath was short, he was relieved he’d managed to speak the words. He heard Fang’s staggered breath beside him and a light, cool sheen of sweat broke out on the mage’s forehead. Fang’s hand came to his shoulder; it slid across his chest until his arm was wound around his shoulders like a serpent. It was an embrace, of sorts, both one of control, and one of weakness, for though while touching him like this Zedwig grew more and more intoxicated with his power, it also held the overlord upright, because as Zedwig grew in power, Fang weakened. His physical weight bore upon him, although Zedwig could have borne three times as much at this moment.

There was a long moment before Fang replied, where the only thing that was prevalent was Zedwig’s breathing and his. The magic between them shifted, glowed, turned, and then began to oscillate as it reached a harmonious plateau; it was some sort of perfect and resonant state between them, and though Zedwig was only lost in it now, he would come to regard this single moment with wonder and curiosity for the rest of his life.

“The statue,” whispered Fang, and as he did, the harmony between them dissipated instantly, slipping into disorder and wild array.

“No, Fangline.”

“Yes, strike at the heart,” he whispered into his ear.

“Fangline!”

Fang grew in power beside him, perhaps fueled by his rebellious spirit, although Zedwig would never know just what it was that gave Fang such intensity. Zedwig was determined to make an argument of it, though.

“It is priceless, Fangline, it cannot be replaced,” he whispered quickly. “Please...”

“How powerful we are to destroy it,” whispered Fang against his ear. “To destroy something held dear by so many, it is more than taking a life, isn’t it? It is taking the past and the future, forcing what would be into what we want.”

He sensed Fang moving towards the threshold of no longer asking Zedwig to comply with his desires, but forcing him to do it, and fear began to float around him, buoyed by the power that engulfed them both.

“Don’t make me do it,” he whispered, pleading.

“But I want to,” was Fang’s ardent reply, both to himself and to Zedwig, and he lingered upon that razor’s edge between cooperation and compulsion for a long, agonizing moment in which Zedwig held his breath and the world was empty save for that one point in time and space. And then he began to slip across it, to cross it until there was no turning back and it could not be stopped, and as he did, his lips moved against Zedwig’s ear and he sighed existentially, “What are we?”

But Zedwig hardly heard the words as he began to madly suck the power from within Fangline without conscience or inhibition into himself. He wished to drain him, to take every mote of strength from him, and most of all, he wanted to destroy, beginning with the statue of Ena. Fangline moaned beside him from both weakness and joy, his pleasure only heightened by the greatness of Zedwig’s destructive power, and he wielded the power masterfully, drawing it into great passionate arcs which could take any number of lives and destroy any number of dreams at will. He drew more and more power, greater than he had ever conceived of holding at once and clutched Fangline to him with only his power and will. They became one; not harmoniously as before, but through force and like a great screaming river, and as Zedwig went further into the depths of the power, he sought an end that he began to sense was there, though he didn’t know what it could be.

He was distantly conscious of his physical body, and heard a full, shifting breath drawn by himself. The sound was compelling and soothing, like the rush of water in a cool stream, but the rest of his consciousness was elsewhere, riding upon a symphony of power he wrote entirely with his own brilliance.

He began to see it; and to describe what “it” was might be impossible, but it was that power that governs the universe, that binds matter, that turns seasons, that moves the smallest blade of grass in the wind and the greatest, swirling galaxies in a sublime, ticking clockwork of fitted gears and perfect cogs. It was sensual; but sex and sensuality were only the beginning, tiny playthings easily misunderstood and poorly used in the hands of children, but the power was bound up in it or it was bound up within the power, and with it was the power over life and death, and he realized it was outside of those things, and more, so incomprehensibly more that these mortal powers he possessed were only tiny pieces and parts of a great river. His mind strained at the seams trying to grasp it and as his power threatened to slip away from him, he drew back with a gasp, holding it, and no longer searching for more.

He felt Fangline beside him and relished the sensuality of his own mortality, then he tore the power from the universe, binding it, compelled to make it his own as Fangline and the earring he wore clutched him and his wild power within the overlord’s will. Zedwig was aware, so acutely aware of everything around him, that even the smallest noise that escaped Fangline was not outside his notice, nor the hand that grasped his coat against his side, and as he formed the great fireball that would change time and destroy the greatest treasure that lay within the City of Ena, he groaned within himself for the pleasure of life.

Not very long afterward, he and the mages had very nearly burned the city to the ground. Mostly it had been Fang’s wishes, but Fang had grown very weak by the end, and Zedwig had taken control entirely of the attack. His intoxication and compulsion had kept him going far longer than he should have, and this time he had used more power than at any time in his life, and in fact, far more than he should have been able to physically bear. At the last, Ena stood in flames, and Fang fell to the ground beside Zedwig, unconscious and spent.

“Regnar!” called Zedwig, and the guard came to him within moments. “Take him and keep him somewhere safe.”

“Is he dead?” asked Regnar, looking as dense as he usually did, and Zedwig wondered if it was his humanity that made him seem dense to the elf, or if he really was.

“No, he isn’t dead,” Zedwig replied patiently. “He needs rest; that is all.”

Regnar called to a few of the other human soldiers, and they lifted Fang from the ground and carried him away. Regnar returned to Zedwig, looking flummoxed.

“So now what do we do?” he asked Zedwig, confused over how to proceed with the occupation of the city without his overlord to command him.

“Find someone else to do it. A spokesman for Fangline,” he said. “It doesn’t matter who it is, for I’ll be right there beside him.”

As he watched Regnar go in search of a “mouth” for Fang, Zedwig knew that he could never come into full cooperation with Fang, for they were not only too powerful while combined to exist in this world, but he could no longer trust Fang to stay his hand. Somewhere deep inside himself, he also knew he couldn’t trust himself to leave it alone: not anymore. Even now his body thrilled with the lingering motes of what they had done, and how terrible had it been! He knew he would pay sorely for it later, and he feared his suffering would go far beyond the physical realm. Above all, though, Zedwig was tired, abysmally tired, but he had a job to do and once it was done, he would be free to die.

Chapter 39 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:17:00 +0000

XXXIX

It had been as if nothing happened at all. It was as if Zedwig didn’t remember, or pretended not to remember, or desired not to remember, and any of the three Fang felt like a splinter in his bones. The mage had lost consciousness at some point during the time within the mist, and hadn’t regained it for nearly two weeks, during which time Fang feared the anxiety he felt would wring him tightly as a rope towards his own death. Sometimes he thought death would be better than lingering on the edge of not knowing whether Zedwig would wake or not. At least then it would be dark, and he imagined it would be cool as a stone in the morning and vacuous: missing the harried things that had tormented him for all of his years. He did long for it at times, but there was no one to tell that to, and besides, he was helplessly addicted to the thrill and life he found in certain things.

He stood tonight with his hands resting upon a map on a small table within his tent. His posture was rigid, and his gaze was distant, as his thoughts were consuming him beyond his control. Two guards stood nearby, but in an innocuous manner that would not draw the overlord’s attention. He was clearly disturbed, and everyone with any experience knew how the mood of Fang could turn into a slicing blade on a moment’s notice. Naturally, the interior of Fang’s tent was thick with tension, and it was into this atmosphere that Zedwig entered, neat and collected.

Zedwig’s bearing was neither hostile, as he had just been after waking from the healing by Al’bert’s healer, nor was it overly familiar. There was a polished wall there, but also an open-ness he hadn’t allowed Fang since he had taken the mage under his control. Fang straightened as Zedwig approached, and said nothing as he acutely attempted to sense where all things stood at this particular moment. Zedwig came to the opposite side of the small table, and as he did, Fang could see he still looked tired in a lingering way that gave him a certain look that brought to mind perfect beauty driven slightly past the edge. He wondered if the healer hadn’t been strong enough to fully restore Zedwig this time, or if he simply had reached the point where full restoration was no longer possible.

Zedwig’s eyes rose to look at him very directly, amethyst… always amethyst. Fang could barely stand how he loved, hated, and feared them, and at the root of it all, he knew despairingly that he could not live without them.

“What are we to plan, Fangline?” he asked him in a way that seemed resigned but efficient.

Fang poured his attention into the map below him and concentrated on losing himself in that which he loved second-best, because it was certainly not all bad, and really quite thrilling. He placed an index finger squarely upon the canyon some miles north of Schloeffelonia.

“There is nothing above us but wasteland until we should reach some simple human cities in the far north, and so I would like to pass through this canyon instead and begin working on the east.”

“Kazaad’sandish?” asked Zedwig.

“Perhaps we’ll get that far this year,” Fang replied. “Perhaps not.” And after saying this, he regarded Zedwig thoughtfully as they both knew it mostly depended on the mage’s health. His eyes left Zedwig, and he shifted his finger across the thick paper of the map to a city in the east. “I would at least like to make it to the City of Ena before the snows come.”

Zedwig drew a breath, and Fang knew he was shifting, oscillating between and collection and disarray. He leaned onto the map, where his loose fist covered the city beneath his hand, leaned towards Zedwig, and used all of his capacity to calm him with his presence. He gazed at him, and then did something he never had before.

“Do you have any suggestions?”

Zedwig was wholly surprised to hear this question from Fang, but Fang noted that physically he hid it well as it was only apparent through a glance and a change in his brow, however hiding it was all for naught as they were both aware of the array of emotion either one of them might be experiencing at any moment. Still, lifelong habits continued regardless of their combined intuition, and even so they were capable of surprising each other.

“Yes,” said Zedwig experimentally, as if his utterance could possibly bring out a sudden backlash, but it didn’t, and Fang simply watched him as his weight shifted slightly beside the map. Seeing the way was free, Zedwig’s finger fell to the east side of the canyon, where a very small town was nestled. “It is not necessary to do anything here, as long as they are docile. This town means nothing, and at the very most we should only gather supplies from them.” He moved his finger lightly across the few towns in the plains between the mountains and the range that hosted the City of Ena. “These are likewise. Easily we can bring them into the empire without any manner of violence.”

Fang moved a little, his tolerance waning, but Zedwig continued, pretending not to notice. “Perhaps the City, well-walled as it is, will require some work, however,” and his finger moved to the City of Ena, where Fang’s heavy hand still lay. “I don’t believe burning it to the ground is in our best interest, for what is destroyed has to be rebuilt.” He glanced up at Fang in the way of testing heated waters.

Fang himself was a study in painful conflict, as he found it extremely difficult to relinquish control of even the smallest matters in the course of his campaign. It was his, entirely his, and he delighted in it, and the greatness of his power gave him the release he had craved for so many years. But if he were to give in to Zedwig, there was the possibility for something that he had never had which was so compelling and terrifying that at any given moment he might cast it away like a scalding rock or clutch it to him with desperate need. Because, if he were to give in to Zedwig, it meant only one thing; he would be giving Zedwig power, not only power within the campaign, but a power over him so great and overwhelming to consider that it caused the deepest, most inner workings of him to tremble with the possibility of being wounded. Trust was foreign to Fang, and finding the means within him to rest in that invisible net of faith seemed a nearly impossible task for the overlord.

But as he feared this from Zedwig, he feared the loss of him even more and that particular thought brought out in him a searing, red spike of anxiety that seemed to eclipse everything and anything else. He moved his hand away from the city upon the map so that Zedwig’s delicate finger could mark it and he could feel Zedwig consciously sensing his conflict and responding… with comfort. It was nearly more than Fang could bear, and he could not look at him.

“We will see,” he replied in a clipped manner that indicated the ending of discussion.

But it did change, something did, anyway, and as they marched eastward the army and those involved with the campaign from the beginning marked it with a quiet curiosity, for, though no one dared to ask Fang directly why there were changes, everyone noticed there was a distinct, although not total, lack of violence, and a greater bounty of negotiation.

It was also possible for even the most casual observer to note that Zedwig, although he had always been the constant companion of Fang, became such in a more equal way, and there was much backroom theorizing among those who watched on why or how this could be. That Zedwig was still a slave to Fang was not a question; the overlord continued to order the mage, although perhaps with less force and without the flaming temper that once possessed him, but the overlord and the mage were often in consultation with each other, and it seemed, although it was hard for nearly everyone to imagine this to be so, that the overlord listened to the mage and even obeyed his wishes from time to time.

As it was the army of the empire of Schloeffelonia marched across the plains east of the mountains like a great dark cloak, and even though they did not burn all that they came to, the spreading infamy of their past caused most to surrender without pause. The others, the larger towns, would sometimes negotiate, but all laid down before them eventually as there was no other choice, and at these meetings of negotiation, Fang, Overlord of Darkness would sweep into the room as menacing as a cruel shadow, but beside him was always the mage, whose gentle countenance brought to many who faced them a measure of hope.

It was true that Fang became tempered by Zedwig, once he allowed himself to be, and on occasion he wondered if he was losing his edge to the mage. It was directly after one of these negotiations that he stood with him and watched the relieved and sorrowful humans leave: relieved for their lives, and sorrowful for their loss of independence. As the guards around them began relaxing and moving onto the next topic with the chink of weapons and the low murmur of male voices, Fang looked over at Zedwig, who always had a sense of regret about him, even long ago when he first came to know him well at the palace, and now was no exception to the rule. He never asked the mage what could be wrong; he had always known it was him that was wrong, the confrontation of which made a certain rebellious fury rise in him that he didn’t want to pursue right now, but still, at this moment, he badly wanted to ask for the normal way it felt to simply inquire after another’s well-being. He touched Zedwig’s arm.

“What is it?” he whispered to Zedwig, whose attention immediately shifted to Fang, although the regret on his features lingered. Zedwig looked at him wearily and did not deign to respond, although it wasn’t haughtiness that caused his silence, but conflict over how much to say. “Do you need another healer?” he asked him, but regretted it instantly, for Zedwig began to withdraw, looking pained.

“Zedwig,” he said to him as he stepped away, and then, feeling very conscientious of an eavesdropping guard nearby, he drew himself up and began again. “Mage Zedwig,” he said, forcefully. Zedwig stopped immediately, although Fang hadn’t compelled him to do it, at least not with the artifact he possessed.

“Could we speak elsewhere, Overlord?” replied Zedwig, giving all respect and behaving perfectly distant for the subject of an overlord. Fang replied in kind, ordering the eavesdropping guard to escort Zedwig to his tents as he finished his lingering business. The guard’s eyebrows only rose slightly, but it was enough to cause Fang to sigh with exasperation as he turned away. He made a mental note to have that one put on the front lines.

It was later, far too much later, that he came at last to his own quarters, for much of Fang’s time was occupied by others who needed his words on a myriad of small details, all of which seemed to compound on each other and multiply unless immediately tended to. He thrived on it, in a way, and was certain this was what he was meant to do, and there was something within him that prevented him from relinquishing even the smallest parts of the campaign to anyone else. He worked tirelessly, and this was because he loved what he did.

Within, Zedwig had several of his students around him, and it appeared that he was instructing them, although in what sort of field, Fang couldn’t fathom. They looked weary, some more than others, and Fang made a mental note to form a committee to research the best way to heal this particular ailment brought on by destructive magic.

Zedwig noticed his presence immediately and sent his students away. They loathed him, Fang was aware, but he saw them as weak, and began to form the idea of Zedwig training a legion of mages as powerful as himself. Well, not quite as powerful, but close, and faithful to him and the empire. Within Fang’s mind the possibility occurred to him that perhaps it was better for the old mages to die, so they could be replaced with ones who did not remember what once was.

“What are you teaching them?” asked Fang as the last of the students glowered by and left via the slit that marked the tent entrance.

“We are working on ways to use destructive magic without killing ourselves,” the mage replied.

“How is that coming along?”

“Poorly.”

Fang made a quiet, noncommittal noise and sat on a chair near Zedwig’s own.

“And you thought you would simply have class in the middle of my tents?” Fang asked Zedwig, not actually reprimanding him, but finding humor in it. There was no humor in Zedwig, though, because he had just been faced with his dying students that he could not help, and there were few things in the world that made him more depressed. In fact, Fang’s humor came off wildly tasteless, and the overlord coughed uncomfortably.

Fang stood, and Zedwig followed suit.

“I have to teach them when I can,” said Zedwig from behind Fang as the overlord removed his cloak and began folding it in his singularly compulsive manner.

“Of course.”

There was a pause.

“What did you want to talk to me about?” Fang asked finally, placing his cloak on a small table and turning to face Zedwig.

“The war,” was the immediate reply.

“What of the war?” rejoined Fang, making what he hoped would appear to be a patient face.

“I would like for you to end it.”

This wasn’t altogether what Fang wanted to hear, nor what he had expected from Zedwig, although he knew the mage had never liked the war at all, and in fact loathed it. Still, one simply doesn’t walk into an overlord’s tent and tell him to stop conquering things. It even made him laugh a little.

“End it? But it is going so well, Zedwig. At this rate we’ll own the world in a few years. Do you think the world would be better off under one government, or separated into tiny groups, struggling for existence?”

“We both know the reason you are doing this is not to bring happiness to the world, Fangline.”

Fang paused, and then admitted, “I enjoy conquest.”

“I believe that would be putting it mildly.”

“Why would I end it?”

“Because it is wrong.”

“Wrong?” asked Fang incredulously, and his temper began to bother him. “And who are you to define what is right and wrong?”

“I am nothing, but I do know it is wrong,” said Zedwig, too mildly. It irritated Fang and he turned aside as Zedwig approached him further. “It is not the case of my standard elven upbringing that I am averse to what you are doing. It isn’t cultural. It is the result of my conscience, and within it I know that the taking of lives and livelihoods at will is entirely, if not damnably, wrong.”

“What are you trying to imply about me, Zedwig?”

“I don’t know,” he replied.

“That I am damned?” he demanded further, pressing the mage.

“I … don’t know what you are.”

“If I am, wasn’t I from the beginning?”

“No, of course not…”

“I was born who I was, wasn’t I?” Fang asked of Zedwig, feeling a familiar flash of anger and frustration. “You knew me; I was never right. I was always the vine that, somehow, grew twisted and in the wrong direction. That’s because this is what I am, Zedwig. I excel at it. I am brilliant at what I do, and you know this. Why would I have been made like this if I wasn’t meant to do it?”

Zedwig only stood and allowed his brow to darken as he gave Fang a look of intense consternation. It forced Fang’s mind to begin to work, which irritated Fang further, but he let it go on. It was true, and they both knew it; Fang was a brilliant conqueror, and one who seemed to never lack for energy or intellect. If there were anyone in the world who could be meant for this, it would have been him. However, even standing before him was a force within Zedwig that seemed to be coaxing him into realizing that this was perhaps not the only fate he could pursue. Perhaps temperance had its merits. Perhaps wanton destruction, though wholly and addictively cathartic, could be milder and rounded into a more intricate and compromising tool. Perhaps the world he had always hated and sought to escape and the one he wanted to mold with his own will could come to terms.

He stood, meeting Zedwig’s gaze and wondering how much of this was his own thoughts, and how much Zedwig was putting into his mind. He wanted to be angry, furious about it, if only he didn’t like Zedwig’s attention focused so intently upon him. His breath grew short with compromise.

“Perhaps,” he began slowly, and watched Zedwig’s countenance begin to change as the mage sensed the words Fang would say as they were being formed in his mind. He looked grateful, relieved, and exhausted, and Fang said the words aloud anyway, but very quietly and only for Zedwig, and though the words themselves were distant and efficient, they were laced with a deeper meaning indicating parley and even surrender. “We will continue to the City of Ena, then adjourn for a season.” After a pause, he continued softly. “And then we will re-evaluate.”

Chapter 38 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:17:00 +0000

XXXVIII

It came suddenly, actually, and while Alice wasn’t especially aware of it, all of the things which had become commonplace for her were soon to change drastically. Al’bert was commonplace, and if she were a betting woman, she would have placed a large sum that he was growing attached to her against his better judgment. She merely found it amusing, really, as he, even after all of this time, knew hardly a thing about her and who she really was. It didn’t matter, regardless, and since he didn’t think to ask, she wouldn’t bother to tell him.

They were in a small town following Al’bert’s failure in the monolith at the hands of Sangwine and his friends, and as it had steadily grown apparent that Al’bert very likely did not plan to finish Sangwine quickly, and as Al’bert stalled and hemmed and hawed proverbially, some of the group that he had gathered lost interest and moved on to greener pastures. For one, Steev grew bored. Alice suspected there wasn’t enough bashing for him, for he was the type to thrive on that sort of thing, and Al’bert had made it very clear he didn’t approve of Steev picking fights in the places they traveled, as was his wont. So it wasn’t long until Steev quit Al’bert’s employ.

The thief left, too, but Alice supposed that might have been for different reasons. He had always admired her from afar, and her continued involvement with Al’bert combined with his naturally nervous nature drove him away with totality one day, although they never knew where it was he had gone.

On this day there was a courier who appeared, and he looked rather flustered, as if he’d been forced into rapid delivery, nearly beyond his physical capabilities.

Dear Al’bert,

I have need of your healer as expediently as possible. Let me repeat: as expediently as possible. Send her immediately and all inconveniences will be sorted out later, and generously. Use only the fastest horses.

Fang

Al’bert read this letter with Alice looking over one shoulder and the Wiz looking over the other. One shoulder-gazer of course was quite a bit taller than the other, but they made a balanced trio, regardless, and especially in reaction.

“What is this?” Al’bert asked the letter, as if it had any more answers.

“Well, it seems I’m off to meet the overlord,” replied Alice.

“Yes, but-,” began Al’bert.

“As expediently as possible,” said the Wiz, and then he grew extremely, and even uncharacteristically, helpful. “I’ll find the fastest horse in town,” he said, and then left with a breeze. Al’bert only spared one brief look of irritation after the Wiz before continuing his sentence.

“Why would he need you?” he wondered. “Aren’t there healers in the south too?”

“Perhaps this is my chance for a promotion,” Alice said teasingly, but her humor was lost on him and his thoughts. She smiled, but it was only for herself since he was still staring at the letter as if it could be decoded, somehow, so she touched his arm and spoke again. “I suppose I’ll be working on my expediency, now. If I leave right away, I can be back in a week or so, depending on how long he might need my services.”

Al’bert didn’t say anything quite yet, but took her arm with his hand to stay her while he began to fold the letter to its former unread state with the other. It was only something he busied himself with in order to allow himself time to think before responding to her, and they both knew it, but he folded it neatly and sheathed it silently into the inner pocket of his coat while his other hand held her with a firm, unyielding grip. At last he finished, and his eyes finally rose. As they met hers, his grip relaxed on her arm, and then fell away, and then he altogether receded from her, although he didn’t move more than a half step away. His breath was short, and so she became very curious.

“You’re acting silly,” she told him blatantly.

“It’s because I don’t know what to say,” he replied.

“Then don’t say anything.”

“I don’t think I can do that.”

“All the more reason to leave right away,” she told him with a half-grin.

The humor relaxed him somewhat; it always did. So he began to speak to her.

“I know Fang, Alice, and … I am probably being useless, but I am…” he stopped, then thought, then meandered: “Concerned…”

“You’re saying you’re worried about me?” she offered.

Al’bert was obviously very uncomfortable with this concept, but his sigh at long last voiced his consent. She grinned as he glanced away, and moved very near to him.

“That’s rather adorable,” she told him closely, almost condescendingly, then gave his silver lock a playful tug. He looked faintly annoyed by the gesture, but it only furthered her enjoyment of the moment as she moved to whisper against his ear, “Good-bye, Al’bert.”

His eyes were closed, she saw, as she pulled away from him. He always smelled like leather and warmth, and as she drew back, she inhaled, savoring it for what it was. As his eyes opened, she gave him her most jaunty smile and left him behind, all the while looking forward to a wild, harried ride towards the south to meet the overlord.[1]

[1] The scene on page #334 is intermittent between this chapter and the next.

Chapter 37 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:16:00 +0000

XXXVII

Al’ice woke first, beside Al’bert, and felt strangely free for a moment. It was delightful, and she breathed, relishing the feel of air coming in and out of her lungs of her own volition. It had worn off of her, after a time, and she’d begun to build up a sort of resistance to it, although she’d never tell him that.

Looking over at the object of her recent vague captivity, she wondered why she didn’t dislike him, or even dispose of him, since there had been many times when she could have. There was something occurring within him she couldn’t define; an inner conflict that was like a war. He was waging it within himself and she really had no idea what part of him was losing, as she hadn’t been as fully in command of her own faculties as she would have liked. Perhaps now she could convince him to let her be only herself, without his intervention.

Perhaps… but there were a few things that barred his way. First and foremost, Al’bert clearly didn’t like not possessing the upper hand in this or, she suspected, any relationship. It seemed to make him uncomfortable; a discomfort that she had enjoyed thoroughly, until he’d had enough. There was a mental mark she kept: if she wished to avoid being ruled by him, she would have to avoid making his ego suffer.

That was a pity, she supposed. He really was too beautiful to have such a striking weakness. She saw that he was under stress even while he slept, as if he never truly relaxed, even in the darkest unconsciousness.

She suspected he liked her especially; although he kept company with an inordinate number of women over the time she’d known him, he generally attempted to keep it from her, as if he thought it would devastate her to know he wasn’t true to her alone. She smiled wryly to think of it, because she’d always known what he was like, and hadn’t expected anything different. He, on the other hand, knew hardly a thing about her.

And he probably didn’t even think to wonder.

He was lying on his side and dreaming, it seemed, and she turned to him and considered. She could probably get up, right now, and leave. She could leave forever, and never see him again. But, and there were always too many “but”s when she considered this, she would never reach the bottom of this well, and she succumbed again to the way of woman, which can’t help but wish to discover the secrets of man.

So instead of leaving Al’bert, she brushed his face with her fingertips until he woke.

There was a short time between sleeping and waking that faded in and out like the curtains that stirred at the window, and when his eyes found hers, they were entirely outside of his influence.

“Al’ice,” he said.

“Alice,” she replied.

He sighed and closed his eyes, then turned onto his back to regard the rafters.

“I know what you’ve done to me,” she told him. “I am quite aware of it.”

“I know.”

“I am still here, however, despite what wisdom would be in the contrary.”

Al’bert began, suddenly and without warning, to wax very deep and introspective, and as if in an earthquake, Alice was rooted still by the shock of it.

“I have long suspected my father used it on my mother,” he said to the ceiling, in the manner of a confession. “I don’t know when he might have started, perhaps from the beginning, and perhaps she never really loved him at all, but she always seemed so intensely compelled about her business, and never naturally fell into motherhood towards Camille and I.”

He seemed to relax and fall further backwards into the bed, as if resignation and futility weighted him down and he continued with a hesitant voice. “I don’t even think I know who she is, my mother, and if he’s done this to her for all of these years, how could she have borne it? How could he not grow tired of it?” His eyes closed. “I can’t imagine the loneliness.”

“Perhaps he loves her,” offered Alice.

“What would it matter? Surely she would loathe him, for such captivity,” he said, and he turned his eyes to Alice. “Anyone would. It isn’t fair. It’s a weakness. One gets used to getting one’s way and then…”

Alice realized he was doing something akin to apologizing, or perhaps vaguely related to repenting for what he had done to her. It made a smile tease at her lips. She leaned closer to him.

“Do you know how many times I could have killed you in the past year?” she asked him.

He focused on her, and his eyes shifted from violet to blue and back as they always did in this sort of early morning light. They tread on the thin, scarce line between the two colors, and sometimes they fell to one side, and sometimes to the other. His moods might do it, or the shirt he wore, but today she caught his face with her hand and willed them to be still.

“Trust me, Al’bert,” she whispered to him, and in the way she had, she looked down upon him and said, “I’m not going to hurt you… much.”

It drew a chuckle from him, despite his impending angst, but it was brief and followed by restlessness. He took her hands from his face. He took her arms and he held her as if to drive the intensity of his conflicts through his hands into her skin.

His voice was passionate and conflicted as he confessed: “Fang has taken my sister for a hostage until I kill Sangwine.”

She knew immediately as he said this that he both deeply loved his sister, and that he did not want to kill Sangwine. She had long suspected that Al’bert, despite all posturing to the contrary, was not a violent man, and was in fact averse to it. In one swift moment she understood where the furrows in his brow came from and sympathy rode through her, as well as knowing that Al’bert wasn’t going to complete the mission, otherwise he would become another man who was entirely different from the one he was now.

“Do you want me to kill him for you?” she asked blatantly.

“No!”

Al’bert seemed alarmed over the idea.

“You don’t want him to die at all, Al’bert?”

“I don’t think I do,” he said helplessly.

“You’re in quite a conundrum.”

Following this statement, Al’bert looked so pitifully miserable that Alice was forced to kiss his face liberally.

“Alice,” he ventured after a time.

“Yes?”

“I don’t want to become my father.”

“Surely your father isn’t that bad.”

“What I mean is… I don’t want to do what my father did to my mother.”

“Isn’t that what you’ve always done?”

“It isn’t, Alice, not really.”

But he seemed unsure of himself.

“Do you find you must always win?” she asked.

There was a long pause until Al’bert drew a breath to speak.

“When we met you unnerved me. You were human and I swiftly grew wildly attracted to you. Human! I’d never thought of such a thing before, and it never occurred to me that I might like it as much as I do. You made me think I might not find my way out again, should I let you rule me, and I will be honest… the prospect of being in a position where I don’t have the advantage terrifies me.”

“You’ve never suffered heartbreak of any kind, have you?” she asked him, suddenly feeling a sort of darkly comedic fascination over Al’bert’s peculiarity. “You’ve always run the show, and if it felt like something might be slipping, you fixed it straight away with that compulsion of yours.”

She leaned closer. “It comes from your eyes, doesn’t it? Eye contact.” His eyes widened a little in response and she knew she’d hit the nail on the head. It made her smile and she let her voice fall soft. “Are you afraid of me enough yet to use it? Do I frighten you, Al’bert?”

Something moved within his aspect. That particular something indicated that he knew she had trapped him. He couldn’t use his glamour on her, now, for it would be admitting his fear. The truth, and she was sure of it, was that he was terrified of her and what she might do to his emotions and pride.

She decided she would relent a little, because poor Al’bert could only be pushed so far, and so she rose onto the palms of her hands and rested there, only slightly asymmetrically, and changed her aspect to one of frank regard.

“Al’bert,” she began thoughtfully.

“What is it?”

“I don’t mean to trap you like I do… it’s just so easy I can’t seem to help myself,” she said with a tinge of the apologetic. Then she went on before he could reply. “But I want to ask you not to use your magic on me anymore.”

She went on to give him a look so sincere he appeared not to know what to say for a time, so she talked again.

“You will become your father if you never allow yourself to be vulnerable,” she said. “And you might as well be vulnerable for me, as anyone. Who else’s hands would you trust your heart in?”

“My sister,” he said immediately.

Alice sighed at him. Then she flounced onto her back, regretting that she was sure she’d made so much progress, and knowing the prospect of feeling jealous over his sister’s hold over Al’bert was downright insulting.

He turned on his side, bent his elbow, and rested his head in one hand as he watched her sulk, and sulk she did, deciding that if he was going to watch her she might as well give an entertaining performance.

“She’s the only person I’ve ever loved in my life,” he told her. “I’ve never been attached to anyone else.”

“Not even your parents?”

“Not at all.”

“Not even any one of your … what do you call them?”

“Diversions.”

“…Diversions?”

“Not really, no. It simplifies things that way.”

“It does,” she agreed.

There was some time of quiet.

“I won’t use it on you if you promise me…”

“Promise you?”

He faltered, as if lacking proper words to say.

“Just don’t humiliate me too badly,” he finally replied, giving up.

Alice laughed, then arose and began dressing and humming in tandem.

Chaper 36 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:15:00 +0000

XXXVI

Time passed for Zedwig, languid as a dirty river flowing with misery, but separate and apart from his innermost self. If it hadn’t been for that which Gaffer had given him in the garden, he would have gone mad long ago. Somehow, it was enough to know that if he had not been in the control of Fang, he would never have done any of what he was forced to do.

Quite a few of his students were now dead, but after watching so many people that he knew and so many more others that he did not know die, a mild numbness began to creep into his senses which buffered him from anguish and only left him in a mist in which he mostly felt nothing.

On this night he sat in a wooden chair that folded and gazed into a real mist that gathered and formed in the hollow valley in which the army of the empire had camped. Another of his students had died today: another one of the elven mages who under his tutelage had always been safe and trusting. They were all betrayed by his ability to control them. Never once had it been considered that this was a liability. Zedwig found himself falling in circles within his mind over why no one ever thought of what might happen, should the worst happen.

This was undoubtedly, in Zedwig’s opinion, the worst that could have happened. Although he often tried to find the best in situations, at least historically, at this particular moment, staring into the nothing that was growing in the hollow, Zedwig was extraordinarily tired and stretched beyond anything he had ever imagined. Gradually, he and Fang had both discovered what exactly it was that destructive magic did to the vessels that wielded it. It was a sort of wasting, but possibly could be better described as a rotting.

Nearly half of the elven mages had died from it already, and healers didn’t seem to be able to wrap their skills around it. The healers could heal it, of course, as they can heal anything, but it killed them shortly. Restoration was impossible from this particular waste.

As it was, they ran out of healers as fast as they could acquire them and Zedwig knew his number was coming. Instead of dread, however, it gave him butterflies to imagine being released from Fang’s restless grip, even if it was into death.

He gazed into the mist. It had arisen from nothing and though it looked unassuming and was utterly silent, it had slowly grown until it was a great mass of fog; a thick cloud against the gently curving green of the valley floor. Nothing was camped there, for the ground was wet, and the guards and others seemed to instinctively avoid walking through its unknown depths, and instead passed around. Zedwig, however, felt a very strong compulsion to lose himself in it.

He rose, and walked to the edge. The edges of the mist curved and drifted in a way that seemed aimless, but he wondered if that was how it sustained itself; ghostly feelers seemed to draw further moisture from the wet air, both feeding itself and calling him into the silence it would offer. He accepted the invitation and entered the mist until he could see nothing but the fog around him.

It was strangely quiet inside the mist, and lighter than outside because the only color around him was a pale gray. He breathed in, and the air was wet and heavy and smelled strongly of rain. He was gone; the only thing of substance in the world was him, at least the only thing of which he was aware was himself. Something tense within him rose from his mind in an arc and emerged upward, flowing through the mist and he sighed.

As much of a relief as it was for him to lose that tension that was within him, he had not been aware that it was that tension which had kept him standing. Without it, he fell to his knees and the weakness and sickness began to overcome him. He knew then that he was going to die, perhaps, here on the wet ground in the fog. Briefly he wanted to die, and then suddenly he knew he was acutely afraid of the idea.

He clutched clumps of green grass in his leaning hands. Pale brown water drifted up through the cracks in his fingers. It was cool and pleasant and he could feel water soak through the cloth on his knees. He wondered what it would be like to fall and lie here, and for once not to care if everything he wore ended up filthy and wet, but merely to feel it soak through to him; into him; around him. He breath stirred the mist beneath him and he began to long for it. The water was a balm after months of fire.

Just as he’d nearly given himself to the ground, he didn’t hear movement, but felt it nearby, moving the fog and setting the water to tremble. In a swift flush it was Fangline who emerged, and the mist tore to shreds around him and his lightning face until he was standing close to Zedwig’s sodden hands, still buried in the grassy muck.

Zedwig, lingering wistfully in the trance of death, considered Fang’s ankles and decided they didn’t look particularly evil, and in fact seemed quite innocent and well appointed. He wondered thickly how far up he would have to go on this particular tree to find the heart of malevolence that plagued him. Knees fell beside him, and he watched a small ring of darker black grow around those knees and knew Fangline felt the same sensation he did and wondered if he liked it.

Though he was not at all aware that Fangline was talking to him, his knees seemed also fairly innocent so Zedwig considered his arms, one of which had moved around him and the other was in front of him, ending in a darkly gloved hand in the water between his own. At this particular time, Zedwig found it a shame that Fangline was wearing gloves and was thus deprived the very pleasant feeling of mud between his fingers. The cut of his coat really was perfect around his arms, and wondered what it was about tailoring that could both hide yet exalt. There were three creases in the fabric that shot outward from his torso underneath his arm and the juxtaposition of angles made him completely certain that his arms were not evil.

However, from this distance, he was aware it was coming. He could sense it pulsing outward and clouding the clear waters that made up the rest of Fangline’s graceful, otherwise unpolluted form. He began to fear it, to dread it, and it overwhelmed the fear of death he had felt just moments before, making death the better end.

Was it in his eyes? He assumed it, but put off looking at his face quite yet, not ready for the burden of it and only drawn to the shape of his leaning shoulder. It was all cleanliness, the lot of him so far, except the haze that radiated from somewhere he hadn’t gone yet. His neck was covered; Fang always seemed to cover his neck with something, and today it was a pale gray scarf woven fine enough to fit inside his coat without disrupting the lines.

It frustrated Zedwig. He wanted to find it elsewhere, anywhere besides in those horrible vivid green eyes of Fangline’s and he reacted suddenly, reaching up with a muddy hand and pulling the scarf away from Fangline’s neck. There was his throat: delicate and vulnerable. He clenched the scarf into the mud with one hand and with the other he touched Fang’s neck and knew, even if the destruction of Fang radiated through it like a maelstrom, it was clean, too.

His hand moved, creating a swath of dirt and water along the side of Fangline’s neck until it came to his face, which he clutched, knowing he would have to look at Fangline’s face now, for there was no where else to go. He would have to look into it and see it for what it was: a vortex of cruelty and madness.

So he did, and he didn’t find what he was looking for. Fangline’s eyes were wide, and Zedwig vaguely sensed that he was afraid. If he had been more tactically coherent, he would have known the absolute truth of this from the fact that Fangline had long since stopped talking, and had begun trembling violently. It was at this time that Fangline had no power over Zedwig, for as he trod on the line between life and death he was beyond all control.

Zedwig searched his eyes, looking and not finding, growing more impatient and desperate. It was gone; the evil didn’t reside in his eyes, and he found them not dark and horrible, but beautiful. Nothing but beauty stared back at him and he felt something twist inside of him; a tightening, and he suddenly knew he would never be here again and nothing like this would ever be possible again for the rest of his life, however brief that might be.

And so, as he was standing on a pinnacle, as he was nearly dead and also nearly alive, Zedwig’s determination sharpened to a razor’s edge and his will became far greater than Fangline’s, even beyond his magnification, and even beyond his artifact. Fangline was gone, trapped, and helpless, and were Zedwig of a clear mind it would have all been over.

However, the story can’t possibly end here.

Zedwig’s entire body was wreathed in magic and the glow echoed off the mist around them. If the mist hadn’t been quite so thick, it might have been evident from outside, but it was an extraordinarily soupish fog, and they were lost in nothing. He did nothing with the magic, however, except feel it. It was second nature; he didn’t even think about drawing it, for as he lingered near death, it was drawn to him and filled him, then radiated outward in soft, brilliant pulses, into Fangline, around Fangline, and then mixing with and drawing power from Fangline’s force itself. Fangline, for his part, was stiff, terrified, and certain the end was nigh.

Zedwig was fascinated by Fangline’s face in a state of fear, wondering what it might reveal to him. He moved his hand and saw the mud it left on his cheek, saw it trailing to his neck and found a strange delight in that particular imperfection. Then, he took Fangline’s face in both of his hands; mud, water, ruined scarf, and even some small blades of grass included, and being somehow above him, he asked him a question.

“Who are you?”

His voice reverberated with magic; it was a whisper, a stream, and a clear voice all at once, and Fangline trembled in response. It didn’t matter how Fangline might have replied, for it was clear that Zedwig could have the answer as he wished.

The depth of Fangline’s fear registered at last with Zedwig to a point; he was looking through a distant glass and he didn’t understand, and so, with every sense and ability he possessed heightened by his strength and weakness near death, he found Fangline’s eyes and did what he might have long before, if he’d known he could do it, or even thought it was possible.

He went into Fangline, his mind searching for answers and for clarity. He wanted to find it: the source of his malevolence. He wanted to know why it was there. He wanted to know why. Why had plagued him. Why would never leave him alone until he found it.

Fangline, behind the surface, was a tempestuous labyrinth whose walls turned and shifted without compliance with physical laws or reality. There was no solid ground that he could discern, only roiling storm clouds and the incessant shifting… shifting. Behind the shifting walls, Zedwig could occasionally see a shining metal sphere with a ring that spun at a dizzying speed with only slightly imperfect balance. He could never see all of it, but only enough to know it was there. Fangline’s face flashed with no discernable clarity from behind one shifting gray-black wall, sullen and withdrawn, and Zedwig went to it.

The wall was between them and it would not move, but he knew Fang was on the other side leaning against it.

Looking downward, Zedwig was standing on nothing. Below were the same storm clouds that were above, and they were laced with a dark poison. He touched the wall, and saw it was obsidian, thick, and cruelly impenetrable, and Zedwig knew that if he were to attempt to walk around its short length, another would shift into its place.

So he moved back and rose into the air, into the roiling clouds, and then fell, plunging himself into the heart of the labyrinth and below, through the clouds which shocked with lightning.

There was the sound of a heart beating. Everything was a deep, dark, sanguine red that faded to black and back again. There was nothing tangible that Zedwig could see or know, but he could feel everything and it ached.

It began with loss, and then mingled with fear. Loneliness filled it until it throbbed with agony. The loss resurfaced again, and the want of something gone; warmth and security were like paradise lost. Zedwig was moved and he fell away, out of Fangline, backwards in a stream until he only saw his eyes, but knew everything that was in them.

Fangline was short of breath and still shaking, and though his tortured expression would have muddled anyone to see it, Zedwig knew the cause and definition of every subtlety that crossed his face.

As he knew this, and as power continued to flow through him and around him, he pulled Fangline to him, brought his forehead to rest on his own, and drew him inside.

Within Zedwig there was much darkness, but unlike the roiling, thunderous clouds within Fangline, it was only velvet blackness, not so much an indication of something dark, but of the absence of anything. But, there was something, which only took Fangline a brief time to find, and it was a doorway to an edifice, from which came a glowing light.

Fangline only approached it cautiously, but with growing curiosity until he stood within it, and gazed at the room within.

It was small but suffused with light, the sort of light that glowed through Fangline and filled him with a sense of something he could only remember once having but never feeling. There was an aisle, and he was drawn down it, even though he felt jagged and filthy, as if covered with streaks of black soot and ash. He looked behind him to see if his footprints left marks of filth on the silent, gentle carpet, but they didn’t, and when he turned to the front again, he could see an altar at the end of the aisle.

He knew what it was, and yet he didn’t. He saw it, and felt it, and trembled before it, all the while surrounded by the warmth of this place, and his unworthiness within it. Stopping before the altar, he stood and his frame shook.

Zedwig came then, from the corner of the room, and as he approached, warmth radiated from him so powerfully that Fangline grew weak and feared he would burn. He smiled at Fangline, however.

“Fangline,” he said, his name falling from his lips with a searing gentleness, and the glow around him was mixed with magic and began to radiate and alternate back and forth in a constant pulse. He touched Fangline’s face, gently, and he fell to his knees before Zedwig in fear and self-loathing.

Instead of allowing him to kneel at his feet, Zedwig moved to kneel himself, and he fully embraced Fangline. As he did, at once Fangline was struck with a rare moment of absolute security, one of only a handful that he had ever experienced in his life. It cracked the stones within his labyrinth until they shifted and broke. The ringed shining sphere spun faster and worse; trying to right itself into a perfect rotation but only growing rapidly out of balance like a machine that might tear apart with the next lopsided revolution. The poisonous storms were thinned and raked aside by a rushing wind, and he was suddenly laid agonizingly bare and laboriously raw. He sighed, shuddered, and then it began to rain.

Zedwig felt it on his cheek first, his real cheek, actually, one drop, and then another. There was a third and a soft sob before the storm began. From the distance, he knew that it was very singular, but it barely changed him; he only embraced him with some measure of increased, detached vigilance as the magic roiled around him and Fangline with greater frequency. For Fangline, however, it tore his very being in an act of violent reshaping. Within the solace of Zedwig’s mind Fangline clung to him and was lost in wretched sorrow for a time, until it slowly faded into numbness. After some time of being spent, he meekly withdrew, left that solace, and opened his eyes.

He was holding Zedwig in his arms, and though the fog hadn’t changed at all, Zedwig had drastically changed for the worse. He looked dead, and Fangline wanted to panic until he felt his pulse, light and bird-like, in his neck. He also knew, somehow, unconsciously, that Zedwig was still there. Suddenly it didn’t matter to him what Zedwig was capable of destructively; suddenly he only desperately needed for him to live. He was precious; priceless; the only thing Fangline possessed with any worth. It drove a different sort of panic through him that made him both uncomfortably vulnerable and fiercely determined.

He lowered his lips to Zedwig’s hairline and sighed against it, already thinking of Al’bert and the healer he’d managed to procure.

Chapter 35 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:15:00 +0000

XXXV

There was a resounding knock on the door that echoed throughout the manor of the Fromage estate. Camilla was reading. She mostly hated the book, which was a pithy romance about two-dimensional male protagonist compelled to save a wholly unlikable damsel who really only did a lot of whining and from the description was probably very mousy in aspect, but there was nothing else she could imagine to do, so she was stuck with it. The knock, violent as it was, was a pleasant respite, and she wondered curiously who that could be.

Perhaps it was a two-dimensional male protagonist.

Her mother opened the door shortly afterward, and she looked strained.

“Camilla, you are wanted,” she said.

Putting the book down beside her, and beginning to actually burn with curiosity by this point, Camilla rose and made her way to the front door, which was being occupied by a few rather large human guards in the outfit of being two of Fang’s soldiers. Her mother took her by the arms and turned Camilla to face her, and did something Camilla felt was very odd.

She looked rather deeply into Camilla’s eyes and said, “Everything will be fine, Camilla.”

Within those eyes, Camilla saw something she’d never noticed in her mother before, and that was what might be described as the spark of life. Her mother, of course, had always been alive, technically, but there was never much to her. She was never very emotional at all, and all she seemed to care about was perfecting the state of their home. Today, however, Camilla saw a number of things on her mothers face, including a deep, buried franticness that still lay chained within her psyche, but stirred.

Perhaps it was that observance that unnerved Camilla the most, for when the guards required she pack her things (well, only some of her things) and come with them that day she wasn’t afraid, and even when she discovered she was going to be the prisoner of Fang she wasn’t afraid, for it was just Fangline, after all. But at this moment, with the id of her mother tapping at the shell she had always resided within, Camilla was scared.

Her father came and touched her mother on the hand, at which motion she subsided, and the restlessness that had just previously been wresting in her eyes was snuffed like a candle. His face was sharp with heat but also restraint as he looked at the guards, and then to Camilla.

“You are a Fromage,” he told her, and touched her cheek.

Following that interchange, she was gone.

The ride to the palace was quiet, and reminded her of other days when she came to the palace on spring mornings with Al’bert to play in the gardens with the prince. Everything looked much the same, except there was a sort of depression lying over everyone she saw on the way. It was perhaps as if someone had painted a portrait of a sunny afternoon, then laid a gauze of gray gossamer over it. It was darker, drearier, and the world seemed tired.

There was no brilliancy to the world, not anymore, and especially for Camilla since Al’bert had been gone. Her mourning over him cut her in such a way that it disallowed her from noticing the small details of depravity that another, keener eye might have seen, had she been watching the faces and lands she passed. Regardless, the elves did carry on, despite derelict circumstances, and they did, to their credit, put on a good face.

The greatest difference that Camilla noticed about the palace as they arrived was the deep green banners that waved as flags from its spires. It was with a bit of dark humor that she realized being at the palace would of course mean she’d be inundated by that horrible green at all hours of the day. However, some consolation for her was that at least now something interesting would happen.

Unfortunately for her, that wasn’t the case. As she was unloaded and decompressed from travel, they took her, and with very little pomp and circumstance, left her in what was to be her residence.

It was a decent room, although she nearly screamed at the green in it. It was large, with a desk, a canopied bed, and some large glass doors that led out to a balcony. Immediately, like a caged mouse might, she went to the balcony, in order to fully investigate the level of her imprisonment.

Outside, the balcony curved beautifully, and she knew there were several of these sorts of rooms to the castle. She was high in the castle; far too high to jump or consider escape unless she was mad enough to consider killing herself. Two large potted roses grew here, entwining themselves around the banister of the balcony: one was white, and the other red. They met in the middle, and each did the other no harm with their placid thorns. She made a note never to lean on the banister, however.

The interior of her room was lit with afternoon sunlight and heavy silence. Testing the door out of curiosity, it was locked. She knocked on it. A large human guard opened it.

“Yes?”

“Can you send a letter to my brother?”

“No.”

She paused. Before she could do anything else, he shut the door, and locked it again. This she found sublimely rude, and knocked on the door again, this time with marked insistence. There was no reply.

She spent the next one or two hours brooding, but eventually decided upon doing something practical, which was unpacking her things. The plain domesticity of the task lightened her a bit, and she was not altogether unhappy, although mostly she was. That night, although her simplest needs were taken care of with great attention, she sat soberly at the desk to write a letter to Al’bert even though she knew he wouldn’t read it, at least… not anytime soon at the very best.

Dear Al’bert,

I found it surprising that Fang would take me as a prisoner, although it certainly could be worse. It isn’t a dungeon, but quite a lovely room on the fourth floor. I’ve some roses to keep me company, I suppose, but the worst thing about it all is that I’m not allowed to write to you at all. Well, I’m allowed to write, obviously, but not allowed to send anything. I suspect this is to create some sense of fear over my well-being. I am well, so do not worry, and even though I can’t tell you, perhaps you’ll know anyway. I hope you are well, Al’bert, and safe, and happy. I’m going to do my best not to dissolve into despondency. Perhaps I’ll be able to talk some sense into Fangline. One never knows.

Love always,

Camilla

Chapter 34 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:14:00 +0000

XXXIV

That Al’bert began to use his compulsion on Alice liberally as time went on was something of which he was strangely ashamed. She changed beneath his hand, and became that which she wasn’t before he’d gotten to her. She changed her name to Al’ice, and although outwardly he professed to it being flattering and yet another pad for his towering ego, inwardly it made him cringe.

All of this cringing and unhappiness was carefully boxed away, however, and buried in a chest deep within the ground of his mind. Al’bert knew what he had to do, and he would do it.

Through his distraction with Al’ice, however, he had lost Sangwine. The idea was somewhat ludicrous, considering that Sangwine had stuck out like a sore thumb everywhere he had gone. However, it was true; Al’bert had lost him in a terrible way, and now it wasn’t a case of Al’bert only biding his time and being able to take care of the prince whenever he should want, but he had lost that freedom and had to find Sangwine again in order to regain it. What he would do then was a matter up for debate.

As time wore on they searched, and letters came from Fang.

Al’bert,

I require that you finish your job expediently and without further delay. It has taken far longer than I had expected. What more can I do to give you a sense of urgency regarding this problem?

Fang

- - - - - - - -

Fang,

We are always drawing closer. The target is far more adept at the clandestine than I had first supposed. I will update you when we find something.

Al’bert

- - - - - - - -

Al’bert,

It has been months and you have done nothing that I am aware of. Are you out for a jaunt? Do you not realize this world will soon be entirely under my dominion? Will you cross me, knowing the consequences?

Finish it.

Fang

- - - - - - - -

Fang,

I have not written because there is little to report. I ask your indulgence in this problem, but he has been difficult to procure. Finding one person in the whole world can be a difficult task; I hope you can understand especially if that person wishes not to be found.

Al’bert

- - - - - - - - -

Al’bert,

“Indulgence” is something that I don’t do, Al’bert, and the sooner you digest that, the better. Your ineptitude grows tiresome, and I’m not certain if you need more motivation that what you are currently under.

Fang

- - - - - - - -

It was this last letter, which came to him some months after the first, which gave Al’bert pause. It was at this time that he realized the balance of power between Fang and himself had not only tipped, but was slipping away from Al’bert and becoming something entirely unsavory.

Fang was what he was; he was a dictator, now. He was an emperor. He was the most powerful man in the known world. Al’bert was nothing but a small count from a distant land, and he was entirely beholden to that which Fang desired.

For most of the past year, Al’bert had been sure that his lifelong association with Fang was enough to keep him secure. He began to wonder, now. He began to wonder if, unless Al’bert was willing to kill for Fang, his future wasn’t altogether as secure as he had once imagined.

He also began to wonder if, should he deign to do the things Fang required in order to maintain his status, his future would be even worse than if he should not.

It was in this state of mind some time later that he arrived in Mud City, and found Sangwine at last, reduced to entering swordfights to earn his keep. It was this state of mind that led him to intervene at the last hour, and to save Sangwine’s life as the prince’s blood stained the fight-room floor. Out of the hands of a pixie that loathed him and the humans who were bewildered by him Al’bert had carried the Sangwine, against all that he knew he should do and knowing he was forfeiting himself, should it become known. It was this state of mind that began to torture him, and as he split further and further into two parts, Fang took that which was most dear to him in all of creation and held it for “safe-keeping”: his sister, Camilla.

Chapter 33 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:14:00 +0000

XXXIII

Camilla was tired of the Fromage estate, most especially because Al’bert was no longer in it. She hardly saw her mother and father, although that was nothing new, and was just the continued course in which her life had always been set. No, she missed Al’bert badly, and began to wish she had insisted he allow her to come along.

At home she did the best she could to entertain herself. Master Bellafringe made her another gown, although her father quite unexpectedly informed her later that such indulgences were not to be allowed until after the war was over. That was the kind of thing of which she had never heard, and it made her dislike the war even more. It seemed frivolous and boring, and it took from her both Al’bert and Fangline.

Fangline, or rather Fang, she supposed was never hers in the first place. It had always seemed as if he tolerated her rather than approaching anything resembling love for her. She supposed she didn’t quite love him, but was more along the lines of fascinated with him. He was the only man who had ever been almost entirely resistant to her, after all. Then at last, when she was finally getting somewhere with him, he had to go and cut his hair and leave Schloeffelonia in a moody rush.

She would scarcely tell anyone (except Al’bert, of course) that when she heard that Fang had returned, she got butterflies, never mind the sordid news of what it was he did upon his return. The king was dead, and it mattered very little to her, since he had always been an extraordinarily dull person in her eyes anyway, and she hardly knew him. Of Fang’s aunt, she knew even less, except what she had picked up through Fangline’s incessant complaints over her harassment of him. However, when Fang had begun a swift and methodical execution of everyone related to the Schloeffel line, Camilla had begun to feel fear replace the fascination.

That had been his first act as ruler, and it put everyone in a state of shock. One night she had come to Al’bert regarding it, as that day his friend Ganlin had been executed for his distant blood, along with quite a few other quasi-Schloeffels.

He had quietly described it as if a box that contained a serpent had been opened and would not shut. It made her relieved they were who they were. Surely the Fromages were untouchable in this new world.

But this night Camilla walked the silent, perfect halls of the Fromage estate and heard her father talking with more fervency than he generally allowed himself. She could hear it all the way down the hall and knew he was agitated, as the timbre of his voice rose and fell in a pattern she recognized like a song, for Camilla was, above all things, brilliant with voices.

At the door, which was open just a few inches, she saw her mother was with him. They were rarely together, and Camilla never assumed there was much love between them, for “indifferent” was the best word to describe their union. Consequently, seeing them together now piqued her curiosity, both in the plain curiosity which rode upon her surface, and deep within her, in the child which craves the holy grail of security: parents who love each other.

This latter motive she was not consciously aware of, but she did watch them secretly with intent.

“This war is madness,” her mother said to le Duc.

“It is what it is,” he replied shortly.

“It is a waste and you can’t pretend we won’t be affected by it.”

“I’m not pretending anything,” he returned irritably. “We will be affected by it, and for the better, Seline.”

“I despise it,” she rejoined.

“It doesn’t matter how you feel about it,” he replied, and Camille was a little taken aback by his unkindness.

“Does it matter if I despise you?” she asked him. Camille saw her father stand still for a long moment, as if frozen.

Yet, it was with resignation that he replied.

“No.”

For no reason Camille could discern, tears stung her eyes and she left as quickly and as quietly as she could manage. She spent no small amount of time that night crying upon her bed, alone, and missing Al’bert terribly.

Dear Al’bert,

Please come back. I’m miserable. Mother and Father are useless. I can’t stand anything at all. Oh, Al’bert… please.

Love,

Camilla

- - - - - - - - -

Dearest Camilla,

Were I under the orders of anyone but he who has sent me to do this, I could return straightaway, but you know as well as I do that going against the will of Fang is foolhardy, at best.

Try to do something that will take your mind off of things, and perhaps I will be home before you know it.

Love,

Al’bert

Chapter 32 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:13:00 +0000

XXXII

Al’bert woke feeling very odd. It took him longer than normal to become aware of his surroundings, and when he did, there was a tree root uncomfortably beneath his arm. As coherence began to grasp him, he saw Alice was standing above him, and gazing towards the west. How he knew it was the west in the middle of this forest, he wasn’t quite sure, but when one gazes like that, they’re always gazing towards the west.

Her skirts moved slightly in the wind and he noticed every rustle and bend of the fabric as it was very close to his face. Not only did he find it very bizarre that they were both fully clothed upon waking, but he couldn’t remember what happened last night… at all.

He leaned his head back and closed his eyes, focusing on what he could remember, certain that there had to be something still within his powers of recollection. He knew he had nearly lost his mind kissing her, but after some time of that, it all faded away and he couldn’t find it no matter how hard he tried. Opening his eyes, he shifted his arm off of the offending root and tried to sit up, whereupon he was struck with a sudden bout of disorientation that turned his sight to black and filled him with nausea.

He must have groaned or made some kind of noise involuntarily, because when his sight cleared, she was kneeling beside him, looking down into his face. She didn’t appear very concerned, only interested, and for some reason that chagrined Al’bert. She studied his face until, gradually, her lopsided smile came back.

“Are you ill?” she asked him blandly.

He was still catching his breath from nothing and attempted to sit up again, for Al’bert was nothing if not a stubborn man. This time he made it, brushing her off and collecting his senses with as much orderliness as he could manage. His head throbbed in time with his pulse, and he felt unusually weak.

Alice waited patiently near him, on the ground.

He looked at her and said, “What did you do to me?”

She blinked.

“What do you mean?”

“I feel terrible and I can’t remember anything!”

“You forgot everything?” she said, with a casual interest in her nails. “That’s a shame.”

“Yes, I forgot everything!” he began, but could only muster the beginning of an accusation. “Because you…”

“Because I…?” she asked him, then leaned close, across him, and kissed him.

It didn’t help matters that he really did enjoy kissing her. Besides that, he didn’t know what it could possibly be that she did to him, and so began to wonder if he’d hit his head on a root or something instead.

“Did I… fall or something?”

“Hmm,” she replied, kissing him again, languidly. She tasted him, forcing him to lose his thoughts like seeds scattering in the wind and took her time with it until she finally murmured, “Yes.”

That was enough for Al’bert.

From that moment forward, time began to move in a pleasant, lilting line. The group began to track Sangwine, but cautiously, for Al’bert wanted to observe him first and since he was providing everyone’s paycheck no one raised issue. The only person he really had to deal with was Fang.

To: Overlord Fang, of Darkness et al

Regarding the mission to finish the sojourning prince, I have gathered:

- one wizard: elements; golems; illusion; material manipulation

- one thief: paranoid yet effective; small and swift

- one warrior: half-ogre; nearly seven feet in height; spectacularly strong, and

- one healer: effective; also proficient with knives

I don’t believe this will take very long. How is the battlefront?

Regards,

Le Comte Al’bert du Fromage

- - - - - - - - - -

Al’bert –

The battlefront is spectacular. You should be here, that is if you could finish that already. If you could only see what it is Zedwig does with the other mages; it is scarcely to be believed. His power continues to astound me… I can only think of where I will use it next. We are victorious, but Sangwine’s continued life nicks at me. Finish it, now. End it, Al’bert, and then come back to me.

Fang

On receiving this letter, Al’bert had been surprised at the sudden familiarity with which Fang addressed him, but, having known Fang all of his life and being fully aware of the severe swings in mood which he had always been subject to, he shrugged it off. His mind was far more occupied with observing Sangwine, who thought he was entirely alone despite all the people surrounding him, including a thoroughly cloaked Al’bert.

Al’bert had to admit to a sort of sordid fascination over Sangwine, who had always been a deliriously happy individual, and was now thrust into possibly the worst circumstances imaginable for someone like him.

They were in a smallish town, one that had three or four taverns to it, and this wasn’t the one they were staying at. In fact, none of the others knew he had actually found Sangwine at all. Regardless, there he was, sitting alone at a table and looking ridiculously obvious. Al’bert pitied him.

“Is that him?” Alice whispered into his ear.

He was shocked by her sudden appearance, although he didn’t really mind her whispering in his ear like that at all. He would have to convince her to keep this a secret from the others later.

He gave a nod meant for her, and glanced over to see her regarding him critically.

“He’s beautiful,” she said, and Al’bert felt irritation tinge through his insides like a needle. However, she had stated it as fact, not as admiration. At least there was that. He made a mental note to work on her diligently, because the balance of power in this relationship wasn’t nearly as lopsidedly tipped in his direction as he would prefer.

“How are you going to kill him?”

She asked that question as if asking him what color he was going to wear. It made him shiver, and he began to wonder who she was. He looked away from her.

“I don’t know.”

There was some silence between them.

“Do you think I could meet him tonight?” she asked.

“No.”

“Why not?”

He really had to get control over her. He had to.

He took her wrist in his hand and turned her to look at him. He kissed her wrist once, on the inside, and she knew. She knew and it burned him, raking his ego with claws and sinking it downward in flames. He recoiled at the sensation’s unfamiliarity, and at the humiliation with which it spoiled him.

It was more than Al’bert could bear, and so he used it on her. Only a little: it was a twinge that he could scarcely discern, but her eyes opened slightly wider in response, and she began to pull back, away from him. He tightened his grip on her wrist, wondering if it worked differently on humans than with elves, and tried again, more than before, until her breathing quickened. He kissed her wrist again.

“Stop that,” she whispered at him, and he began to think she might know exactly what it was he was doing. He decided to feign ignorance to the last. His ego was on the line, after all.

“Stop what?” he asked her warmly, and sent more into her until she sighed. Her eyes focused on him with a strange mixture of anger and admiration, and he knew which came from what source.

It wasn’t what he wanted to have done with her, but he had no choice, really. He preferred who she was, and he generally preferred not to use it at all, but she’d constantly given him the feeling like he was trying to tame a wild horse all the while being trampled into the dust by it and he’d had enough. There were more important things to worry about. There were limits. He had limits.

Her wrist relaxed in his hand and her posture changed until she looked as if she were almost pleading with him, yet she said nothing. He sighed, and then kissed her.

Sangwine rose and left, and neither of them knew it.

Chapter 31 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:12:00 +0000

XXXI

The next morning as they set out from the inn, Al’bert was both disturbed and intrigued to find he was suffering from an unusual level of distraction over Alice. Beyond that, however, he’d heard from a few people of the passing through of Prince Sangwine, and his trail wasn’t entirely cold. Al’bert knew he could catch him, and honestly wondered what Sangwine thought he was going to do with himself.

As they moved into the sunlight from underneath the shade of the inn’s front porch, he felt none of the sure optimism his reason told him he should be feeling at this moment.

He did have a fairly decent, if variegated, group put together, and with their combined abilities he should be more than able to do exactly what it was that Fang expected of him.

There was a problem with Fang, though. He knew what Fang was doing with the “empire”, but he didn’t know how Fang expected to succeed at it. Al’bert dismissed that thought in his mind and decided the best thing to do would be to focus on his own immediate problems, which included managing four very different personalities that were now in his employ.

The Wiz seemed to think that Al’bert was inexperienced and uneducated, for he was continually leaning his formidable knowledge and judgment on Al’bert’s slight shoulder. It took all of Al’bert’s negotiating abilities to keep the Wiz from wresting control of the group from him altogether, and though a power struggle was something which he didn’t need or desire in the slightest, he kept the Wiz with him if only because his father so highly recommended the fellow.

The thief was consistently uneasy, and Al’bert wondered how long it would take for that to grate painfully on his nerves. His few attempts to make polite conversation with the fellow wound up making him feel like an interrogator, as the thief’s reactions were always of the denying sort.

Steev, on the other hand, was as indifferent as possible and possibly the one of the four who required the least maintenance. He seemed content and even vaguely pleasant, as long as he got paid. Al’bert had reconciled himself to the fact that the half-ogre was a “he” and not an “it”, and had a few proud moments over his liberal mentality.

Alice, for the last, he was both glad to have picked up and conscientious over the fact. She turned his mind in numerous ways that left him in vertigo for the time being. Never once had he felt it necessary or desired to have a woman protect him, but since the moment she came into his employ she had spread a zealous mantle of protection around him with her alert mind. He found it both comforting and insulting to his masculinity, and combined with the alarm of his growing attraction to her humanity he could scarcely think of anything else. He knew it would have to be resolved, but he could not yet fully wrap his mind around the inevitable resolution.

“By cart or pigeon?” asked the young carrier, holding a letter Al’bert had written and sealed to his dear sister.

“Pigeon,” replied Al’bert, handing him several coins before turning to view the road beyond the small canyon town. This would be the last he would be able to correspond with Camilla until he came to civilization again, and Al’bert had no idea when that might be.

“Who’s Camilla?” asked Alice in a rather nosy way.

“Did you actually read that from there?” responded Al’bert irritably.

She replied with a nonchalant shrug and began walking down the road, lithe with indifference.

Al’bert caught up with her quickly enough to say, “She’s my sister.”

“Oh?” she said carelessly. She was still walking at a rather intense pace, which Al’bert knew they couldn’t continue for the entire day’s movement, so he took her arm to slow her.

His hand slowed her in more ways than one, and Al’bert suddenly felt sharply aware of her and released her to continue. Her sea-green eyes found his and he made quick conversation.

“She is in Schloeffelonia,” he said. “Have you been there?”

“No,” she replied. “Aren’t only elves allowed there?”

“Of course not,” he chuckled, although he realized he’d rarely seen anyone who was not an elf in his home country for his entire life. He added an afterthought: “We don’t get many visitors, though.”

“Why do you think that is?” she asked him, and he wasn’t sure if she was mocking him, for her delivery was suspect.

“I don’t know…” he said. “Perhaps other races don’t quite feel at home there?”

“Perhaps,” she replied.

“We don’t get out much,” he went on. “This is my first leave of the country in my life, although I’m quite young.”

She studied him for a long moment.

“How young is ‘young’?”

“I’m sixty-one,” he said.

Alice belted out a laugh, and he wondered what was the matter with her.

“Good cripes, you’re an old man,” she said to him, her smile merry with amusement.

“I am not,” he replied indignantly.

“Of course you’re not,” she said, the timbre of her voice changing in an instant and her eyes restless and upon him. He felt the flush and vertigo again, and drew a breath to relieve himself as he concentrated on the road.

“Where are we going?” she asked him.

“The Prince passed through here about two weeks ago, and we’re following his trail.”

“What will we do once we find him?”

“Kill him, I suppose,” said Al’bert, although merely saying it made him inwardly recoil. “That’s what Fang wants, anyway.”

“Why does Fang want him dead?”

“The Prince is the only person who can contest Fang’s right to rule Schloeffelonia,” explained Al’bert with as little emotion as possible. “So in order to preserve his total leadership of the country, Prince Sangwine has to die.”

“Sangwine,” repeated Alice in a thoughtful way. “That’s a funny name.”

“So is Alice,” replied Al’bert.

“And I suppose you’d suggest I change it to Al’ice,” she grinned at him.

“Well, it does have a nice lilt to it,” he said, glancing her way. He felt a twinge of pleasure at the familiarity of this exchange, and his old manipulations began to surface in a new world. He wondered if he could convince her to change her name for him, and accepted his own challenge. He had to do something to entertain himself, anyway.

“You’re self-absorbed, aren’t you?” she asked him in a way that sounded as if she had caught him with his hand in the cookie jar. This was entirely not what he had expected.

“What?”

“Oh come now, Al’bert,” she laughed. “You think I should change my name to sound more like yours?”

Before he could reply she went on. “Now I do wonder if all elves are like you or if you’re merely unique that way.”

Neither point that he could argue was favorable so he changed the subject.

“Sangwine is a derivation of sanguine,” he said. “And it means passionate or red.”

“Now that’s a nice name,” she thought out loud, and seemed impressed. Al’bert felt a tinge of irritation. “Red?”

“The color of blood, to be precise.”

“Well,” she said. “Before you kill him off, I’d like to meet him first.”

She grinned at him, and he gave her an incredulous look.

“Why?”

“It wouldn’t be fair to judge the entire elven race off of just one specimen, would it?” she asked him directly. “Unless you’d say you’re a good example of what most elves are like?...”

She’d caught him in some kind of rudimentary conversational snare, he suspected, although it was full of holes, and it made him feel cornered and strange as he weighed between agreeing to let her meet Sangwine before his death and agreeing that he was like all other elves, which he most assuredly wasn’t. The former was not only a bad idea, but it gave him an odd taste of jealousy that brought him no small amount of distress. He felt jealousy and was forced to acknowledge it, and his precise and analytical mind knew exactly what that meant and he didn’t like it at all.

“You can meet all the elves you want, as far as I’m concerned,” he said shortly. “Just don’t get in the way of the mission.”

He moved away from her with the intention of turning his attention to the wizard, who was behind them on the road. It was a narrow road, barely wide enough for one cart, and it wound downward out of the canyon into the broad plains that separated this range of mountains from a smaller, gentler range to the east.

She’d have none of it, though, and took his arm, which he enjoyed but refused to indicate it by any means.

“Al’bert…” she said to him, smiling as she always did with her own brand of lopsided insincerity mixed with pleasantness. He looked at her and knew they’d moved on to war, and, realizing he’d been flagging and predictable, decided to change everything.

He put his hand on hers and caressed it, briefly, and watched as her face colored slightly. Then, after pulling her hand from around his arm, he left her and moved into conversation with the Wiz.

For the rest of the day he ignored her, except to occasionally meet her glance with his own which increased slowly in heat as the day wore on. Tonight he was certain things were going to change drastically.

And they did.

Camp was made at the base of the mountains in a very small clearing within a large grove, or even a small forest, of pines and birch trees. Once everything was settled, more or less, Al’bert left to wander the forest, with the sole intention that Alice should find him.

He was anxious, and he was dreadfully aware of it as his limbs trembled under the conscientiousness of foraying into uncharted waters. Drawing a deep breath, he looked up at the sky through the canopy above him and saw a pine tree growing very tall and dark like a sharp swath, seemingly unmovable and unaffected by the entire world around it. A birch grew beside it, its leaves so delicate they shimmered in a breeze he could scarcely feel, but he could hear it, like water, faint and running through and under and beside. He closed his eyes and focused on that sound, exhaling with slow, fluid release and willing the trembling to leave his physical form.

When he opened his eyes, Alice was there.

She was standing probably about ten feet away, watching him, and her eyes were restless yet challenging. He wondered how to proceed when she pulled a knife from her bodice and threw it at him.

At least that’s what he thought at first (and not without a small amount of alarm), but instead the knife ran into the edge of his sleeve and pinned his arm to the tree behind him. For a moment all he could do was feel impressed over her ability to aim, but she was approaching him, and everything else fell away like water as she drew near and wholly kissed him.

It was unlike any other kiss he’d ever experienced, and he’d experienced quite a few, but they were all with elven girls and he found himself slowly in the way of thinking that if this were how humans kissed he could get lost in this particular wilderness. She was strong, fierce, and passionate, and if this had been a dance she would have wrested control and led where she would have him across the floor. There was nothing to be done but be kissed, and she did kiss him, on the mouth until he was forced to gasp for breath, and then in a gradual, sensual line to his neck, where she lingered until he felt a white pinch and jumped back in shock.

“Did you just… bite me?” he asked her incredulously. She stepped back one step, then another, the leaning smile always on her face and her eyes a simmering storm. He felt the absence of her presence against him and had to give it to her that she had the whole ‘feast or famine’ technique down fairly well.

She looked over her nails in a remarkably casual way, and then shifting her eyes like a strike at Al’bert said, “Yes.”

The sound and timbre of that word, spoken in that way and in that moment shattered something reserved in Al’bert and released something mindless. He tore his sleeve from the tree and, pulling her into his arms, he kissed her. He kissed her again and again, forgetting and blind with madness, and as he delved with abandon into the want of this woman no matter who she was or what she was, he was entirely unaware the trembling had returned.

He really wouldn’t have cared, anyway.

Chapter 30 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:12:00 +0000

XXX

They were standing in a line, and Al’bert would have found it funny if it hadn’t been so exorbitantly intimidating. There were three of them, and one even wore a helmet adorned with curving horns, securing all of Al’bert’s preconceived notions about barbarianism. Although, horns or not, the helmet didn’t seem to be able to compete with the curving tusks which protruded largely from the half-ogre’s green face.

Al’bert approached them bravely, being able to conceal all indications of unease except for a pesky sheen of sweat that broke out on his forehead. It was the one in the middle who spoke first among them all, who sported armor made of a mish-mash of leather and iron, coating him like an exoskeletal mélange from the center of a mountain. He smelled strongly of the earth.

“You’re the elf looking for help?” it grunted. Well, he grunted, conceded Al’bert after a moment’s self-correction. Al’bert drew himself up.

“Indeed, I am,” he said, and then he looked over the three of them, who were very broad. He had the sudden feeling of being a fly, and the imminent possibility of being smacked into the wall at any moment by any one of six green arms that were probably nearly as thick as his waist. It threatened to be very distracting, but he had been trained to suppress such things.

“A strong-arm is what I need,” he said, and then hesitating, he added, “Only one.”

“How is the pay?” asked the one in the center.

“I am wealthy,” replied Al’bert with confidence.

The half-ogres exchanged glances; then returned their attention to the slight elf before them.

“We didn’t ask about you,” said the center one.

“HOW IS THE PAY,” bellowed the one to the right, with the horned helmet, speaking loudly and slowly, Al’bert could only assume, because he didn’t think Al’bert could speak the native tongue very well.

Al’bert’s brow furrowed with slight irritation, but he replied.

“Quite good, I assure you.”

The one who had been silent as of yet had a hint of red in his coarse and muddled hair, and he leaned to the center fellow.

“They can’t seem to talk in anything but flowers,” he said to the center half-ogre, but meant for the amusement of all. The center ogre, to his betterment, allowed the moment to pass when he could have laughed at the expense of the elf before him, either because he wasn’t the sort to pick on those smaller than him or, more likely, was interested in a well-paid gig.

“I’m looking for specifics,” said the ogre directly.

“Oh, well,” said Al’bert, who blushed, if only slightly, since he considered it entirely rude to discuss the specifics of pay in front of any but the conjoining party, and then only very subtly and as briefly as possible. He cast a glance over the other two half-ogres, felt the presence of Alice behind him, then said resignedly, “Three gold per month, and more should you prove unusually useful.”

Al’bert was completely and thoroughly embarrassed by this exchange, but the half-ogre in the center seemed impressed. The other two were impressed, too, but didn’t seem to matter anymore, for the center half-ogre was obviously the dominant one and if he wanted the job Al’bert sensed it would be his.

So it was with barbarian cultures, thought Al’bert with whimsy, the one with the strongest club swing rules the clan. He was suddenly struck with a realization about his own elven culture regarding that which they considered “strength”, but suppressed it for the time being in order to allow the continuation of his affectations and at least feel intellectually superior. It was the only way he could cope.

“When should I start?” asked the half-ogre in the middle.

“May I ask your name?” inquired Al’bert.

“I don’t think they ever answer questions directly,” muttered a side ogre.

“Steev,” said the middle ogre.

“Well, Steev,” said Al’bert, ignoring the other two ogres. “We’re setting out in the morning. Care to join us?”

“It’s a deal, then,” said Steev refusing to be anything but direct in the face of the elusiveness of elvenkind. He then turned and walked away, his fellow half-ogres turning with him. Al’bert wasn’t to see him again until morning.

Al’bert watched them go, and felt a certain intense stress release out of his body as they passed through the archway that led to the inn’s common room.

“He didn’t even ask who I am,” remarked Al’bert.

“I don’t think it matters to him,” replied Alice from behind him. He heard her sheath a knife and began to appreciate her even more than he did before. “Half-ogres don’t ever care about station, you know.”

He turned to look at her.

“What about humans?” he asked.

“Oh, we’re a mixed lot,” she replied casually, checking another sheath. “I suppose that’s what makes us human.”

“That makes no sense to me,” rejoined Al’bert openly.

She looked at him and grinned her particular brand of lopsided grin.

“Of course it wouldn’t.”

Chapter 29 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:11:00 +0000

XXIX

“Definitely a half-ogre,” said the Wiz.

“Really,” said Al'bert in the way that denotes vague disbelief mixed with consideration.

“You want protection, don't you?”

“Well, yes,” replied Al'bert, but he still wasn't sure. The level of barbarism half-ogres were known to display made humans look like polished nobility, and Al'bert wasn't altogether confident that he wanted to stir that pot within his own employ. Already he had brought in two humans... well, three humans. He'd caught a thief trying to break into his room, and offered him far more than a simple heist would give him to come under his patronage. The fellow was antsy; he wouldn't tell any of them his real name, not that anyone would care, anyway, and Al'bert thought it was altogether silly and self-aggrandizing were he to digress. In the stead of a name, then, he pointed at the thief and called him “Hey you”. It was only mildly inconvenient.

The idea of a half-ogre made Al'bert nervous, however.

“I do want protection, but I don't want the thing to suddenly decide it hasn't had enough violence in protecting me and then club me for dessert.”

“You could start prevention of that eventuality by referring to the half-ogre as a 'he',” said the Wiz dryly.

“Or she,” mentioned Alice, who was only nearby, sitting on a step and sharpening a knife.

Al'bert groaned and massaged his temples.

“Yes, perhaps,” said the Wiz, turning in his chair to regard Alice directly. “But the females of the species are never seen outside of their villages, and since they will kill you should you tread inside the boundaries of their villages, no one has ever seen one.”

He turned back to Al'bert. “Not and lived to tell about it, anyway.”

“I've seen one,” mentioned Alice as she sharpened.

The wizard began to look very annoyed.

“At the Slug and Lettuce,” she went on.

“What is a half-ogre female doing at the Slug and Lettuce?” he demanded of her, and of all of his scholarly sources.

“Serving drinks,” replied Alice plainly.

“'Serving drinks'?” asked the Wiz, who was clearly unable to impress upon either Al'bert or Alice the obscene peculiarity of this phenomenon although he did try very hard with the tone of his voice.

“Her name's Floh,” said Alice, inspecting the sharpness of the blade in her hand with her thumb. “You should go see her; she's rather nice.”

At this point she cast a glance at the Wiz as his elbows struck the tabletop between him and Al'bert and he covered his eyes with his hands in frustration, which was doubtless over being surrounded by such uneducated morons.

She caught Al'bert's eye and gave him a playful grin that amused him more than he had expected from a human. He was beginning to think he might like her, which felt like a revelation. The Wiz recovered from his intellectual agony and went on, long-sufferingly.

“Regardless,” he said. “Half-ogres are, for all of their barbarism, a species steeped very deeply in tradition.”

“Like elves?” asked Alice, although it gave Al’bert a start to think of elves as being similar to half-ogres in any way at all.

Oddly, the Wiz appeared to be impressed by Alice’s powers of deduction. He capped this singular turn of events by saying, “Indeed. Quite like elves.”

Al’bert groaned. There was the sound of a knife hitting a whetstone once, then again.

“You know they aren’t actually ‘half-ogres’ at all,” ruminated the wizard. “The term ‘half-ogre’ is, I suppose, a form of slang for all of us.”

“Then what are they?” asked Al’bert.

“They call themselves- ”

“Lord Fromage!”

The thief burst into the room in a very simple manner and then stood in a frumpy, disheveled heap. He was short, exceedingly short for a human, which made him actually quite a bit shorter than Al’bert and even Alice. He seemed disoriented and uncomfortable under the scrutiny of the three already present, although what seemed to him to be “scrutiny” was actually “mild curiosity”. He turned and shut the door.

“Please,” said Al’bert graciously. “It’s ‘le Comte du Fromage’.”

“Yes, Comte, there are half-ogres outside,” he said breathlessly.

“Well, no, they’re really called- ” began Wiz.

“What do they want?” Al’bert said, talking over the Wiz and letting his curiosity get the better of him.

“They want to talk to you,” said the thief.

Al’bert took a brief moment to be only a little afraid for his well-being, then decided there was nothing to be done for it and stood, straightened his longcoat (which was quite impeccably cut, incidentally), and walked out the door.

What he didn’t notice, however, was that Alice followed him intently, sheathing her knife in a clandestine place.

Chapter 28 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:10:00 +0000

XXVIII

That night, Zedwig sat at a small table within a well-appointed tent pitched for those of highest order within the empire. He was only minutely aware of several guards which attended, for guards didn’t matter to him; slightly more aware that there was food on the table, although of what kind he hadn’t bothered to discern; innately aware of Fang sitting with casual disposition across the table from him, as he was always innately aware of Fang’s presence; but very acutely aware of how he felt.

He was tired; it was a cutting fatigue beyond that which was natural, and again he felt stretched with restlessness; his skin rarely ceased to crawl. His body was rebelling against what was being done to it with a constant, low-spark discomfort he could not escape or relieve. He was wondering thickly if it would fade by morning when he noticed Fang was speaking to him.

He didn’t care.

Earlier, following the burning of Narman City, Zedwig had managed to eventually find himself alone within his own tent that had been given to him. It was there that he cried upon the floor for a time, ashamed of his destruction and even finding shame in his sobbing. He experienced a thorough sort of wretchedness, which tends to spread from the facet that created it to all aspects of one’s life like black ink spreads through water as the mood remains, but gives a buffer at last after all emotion is spent and allowed Zedwig a moment of soft numbness before they found him.

He was found, taken away, and washed as battle and fire had covered him, like most, in a fine layer of dust, which dust upon Zedwig was only allayed by the tears which had cleaned his face in a rough, imperfect manner. All concern was taken for the care of the mage and he scarcely noticed it, but Fang noticed everything.

Again Fang spoke to him and Zedwig deigned to listen.

“Zedwig,” he said, not really looking like an overlord of darkness, as his face showed a subtle measure of concern which would have been difficult to discern on his smooth façade for anyone but Zedwig.

Zedwig replied by looking at him, but the act made him more tired.

“Would you eat?” Fang asked, indicating the food that the mage began to register between them and found it didn’t interest him in the slightest. “Please.”

Fang, however, did not insist, and Zedwig was marked by a very compassionate soul. It might be what a callous person would consider his greatest weakness for it was this deep inward compassion that brought him to willingly give in to Fang from time to time. It was perhaps knowing that Fang could command him to eat, but didn’t, or perhaps it moved him to see Fang relegating himself to his mercy in this one thing. Regardless, within him Zedwig held a deep love for the world, and Fang was part of it. Thus he ate, after a manner, although it was all ashes.

“How are you feeling?” asked Fang.

“I’m very tired,” he said in a disconnected way.

“You… look tired.”

Zedwig did not reply.

“I’ll insist we allow you rest for a few days before we move on,” said Fang decisively. He glanced at a guard, then back to Zedwig. “Surely that will bring you around.”

“Surely,” said Zedwig, sounding more morose than he had intended.

“Look at what you have done, Zedwig,” said Fang, who, with a short command to a guard nearby had the symbolic “key” to the city of Narmans brought out for the mage’s approval.

The pride and soul of Narman City was an intricately wrought compass that was laced with magic. They had in legend attributed their great seafaring power to this compass, which not only told direction, but predicted storms and inclement weather in great detail. Thus they always knew when to set sail and when to harbor. Fang now possessed it as a prize, and in his hands did very little for the dry earth he walked upon.

“In only an hour you have conquered an entire people,” Fang told him, setting the compass on the table between them. It was metallic in a gray-green way that was unlike any metal he’d ever seen before. A sphere upon it spun more and more restlessly as it neared him. He looked at Fang and noticed he seemed to grow alert and alive amidst violence and the talk of violence. “That has never been done before that anyone can remember. Do you realize what this means? You’ve made history. You will always be remembered for your great power.”

“It is you they must remember,” said Zedwig. “I wish to be forgotten.”

“What? Why?”

“Please allow me that, Fangline.”

Fang seemed perturbed. The sphere upon the compass spun rapidly, without relent. Zedwig didn’t like it there, upon the table, in the possession of Fang. It was like a fish left on dry land, struggling to make sense of dust.

“You should be thrilled with what potential I’ve shown you to possess,” said Fang, with a small amount of force behind his words. “Perhaps you don’t understand yet that we can rule the world; the entire world, Zedwig. It is ours for the taking.”

Zedwig opened his mouth to reply, but his hour of weeping from before betrayed him and his breath caught twice. He stood instead.

“I’m very tired,” he said, repeating himself.

“Of course,” Fang replied, and he appeared to suffer a moment of frustration.

Shortly, though, Fang signaled to a guard, who then guided Zedwig with indifferent blind obedience to his own place of rest.

Chapter 27 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:10:00 +0000

XXVII

Dear Camilla,

Things seem to be off to a fairly pleasant start with this quest for the life of Prince Sangwine. First off, Sangwine couldn't be more obvious if he announced his passing at every crossroads. At this point I'm not really sure he isn't doing just that. I suppose I'll find him sooner or later. Camilla, don't tell anyone I wish it were later.

I've recruited the wizard that Father suggested, and he's probably going to be useful enough, although he's a little on the odd side. I'm suffering from culture shock, methinks. He insists on being called “The Wiz”. Do tell me if that isn't weird.

Due to some rare stroke of luck, I happened to run into a healer who is also good with knives. Her name is Alice, and I'm convinced she's lovely. Human or not, she really is. I suppose my horizons are being expanded.

The Wiz has a few suggestions for me as far as getting some more help. He thinks a half-ogre is just the thing to make sure the three of us are protected, and I suppose he has a point. I'm curious if there are road-bandits and the like out here, although I'll guess I won't be going out of my way to run into some.

Meanwhile, my sister, I sincerely hope you're not pining. I would suggest you write Fang but... I ... never mind. Do what you can to find happiness. I hope to be home soon.

Love Always,

Al'bert

* * * * * * * *

Dearest Al'bert,

Ugh, I hate it all. Why is Fang doing this? You don't want to be off killing Sangwine, and I don't want you anywhere out there. I know you love to learn and so on and are curious about the world but to me it just seems odious and filthy.

I'm miserable here. Mother is how she always is. She doesn't care about anything except that everything looks to be perfect all the time. Father seems very pleased with the situation our family is in, what with you being on a “very important quest” for the overlord himself, and all. I'm tired of it. Do you ever wish we were just peasants?

Alright, neither do I. But still, there is so much required of us it makes me want to scratch the walls.

Fang is expanding Schloeffelonia to the western sea. It seems no one can stand before him. I don't get much word, but that much I do know. Please write again soon.

Faithfully,

Camilla

Chapter 26 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:09:00 +0000

XXVI

Al'bert was in somewhat of a diveish inn north of Schloeffelonia, at the mouth of a canyon. It hadn't been hard for him to figure out where Sangwine had gone. He didn't seem to try very hard to cover his tracks, and Al'bert was almost entirely sure it was due to a mixture of ignorance and naïveté. In fact, Al'bert was fairly sure Sangwine would wind up killing himself for the comte, and he wouldn't have to do much of anything at all except follow him around until it happens and then return and report to Fang.

He didn't dwell at all on the fact that he sorely hoped that was how it would happen, and especially didn't dwell on the fact that he didn't really want Sangwine to die at all. It was perhaps safe to say he was in denial over his consequences.

This inn was small and rather empty. It was at the mouth of the canyon on the City of Ena side and was surrounded by mountains and conifers. The wooden siding was painted barn red and it felt very ordinary. Ordinary for most, though, was odd for Al'bert du Fromage. He felt a strong curiosity when he came into a place like this, as well as a level of disgust he tried very hard to suppress in order to further his practical education. The servants who worked and the patrons who were at this particular establishment seemed to be entirely human, and so he believed he'd finally broached the outer edge of where elves dwell. It was a curious and wondrous moment for him, as he'd never left the valley of his homeland.

To be Fang's servant in good faith, he'd right away set himself to finding others to do his work for him. There was a wizard he'd written to, who had known his father, and was the purest sort of mercenary but reportedly powerful for a human mage. He was to meet him here, but Al'bert saw no one of his particular description.

He was drawing attention, he knew, for most of these people had never seen an elf outside of Schloeffelonia, and it chagrined him because he wanted to be able to observe unnoticed. He was wondering to himself how he was supposed to learn anything about these people if they were staring at him all the time when a young woman approached him.

She was fairly young, with blue-green eyes that fiercely denied the calming oasis they should have been. She was dressed like a peasant, but had a swagger he didn't expect and found intriguing, yet humorous. The girl sat down in front of him and leaned to the side in consideration of who and what he was.

“Odd,” she said in a way that implies many things.

“Indeed,” he agreed, feigning only half-interest.

“Who are you?” she asked him bluntly.

“Le Comte du Fromage,” he replied.

“Hmm... the Count of Cheese?”

Al'bert felt a moment of intense irritation.

“That translation is... inaccurate.”

“I wouldn't mind enlightenment,” she said, her grin lopsided, and her blue-green eyes stubbornly refusing to be anything related to serene.

He regarded her with his entire focus for the first time.

“Of course you wouldn't,” he said, and then rose for want of air.

Outside, as he leaned against the doorframe on the front porch of the inn he was plainly distressed. Al'bert was a man used to ruling his surroundings socially, and in this situation there were too many unknowns for him to feel at ease. He felt wrong, out of the water, and obvious. Culturally this wasn't who he was, and he couldn't so quickly assimilate himself to the world, as he would have liked.

“I never knew it was so easy to offend an elf.”

The young woman was leaning on the other side of the doorframe, her arms crossed, as if she'd been there for hours. She was smiling, obviously amused by his odd behavior and unlikely to give up from Al'bert's judgment, although he knew next to nothing about humans yet. Within himself he considered his two choices: He could either; brush her off entirely and gain nothing, or he could let her have her fun and learn something about humans in the process. For Al'bert, the choice was obvious.

“You don't know much about elves, do you?” he replied.

“Probably more than you know about humans,” she said.

“I suppose I can make that concession.”

“So, what brings the Count of ... something... to the Spinning Precipice Inn?”

“I'm looking for someone,” he said.

“Ah,” she said. “What kind of someone?”

“A wizard,” he said. “Seen one around?”

“Yes,” she said.

“You have?”

“Not really, but it was worth it.”

He was losing his patience.

“Look,” she said, drawing a knife from her belt. He briefly thought she might be about to mug him or something, but her smile discounted all suspicion as she raised the knife then threw it in a spinning line at the far porch post. It stuck thickly in the post, vibrating back and forth with the precision of her aim. Her smile really was brilliant as she delighted in her own skill while looking for his approval, and he was forced to grin, despite himself and his unfamiliar circumstances.

She winked at him and pulled out another from the same belt, and threw it to land directly below the last one, then, procuring yet another blade from who-knows-where, she hit the post squarely above the first two shots. Al'bert's eyebrows rose of their own volition, because he was truly impressed.

“I'm good, huh?” she said to him directly, her smile confident.

“Yes, you are,” he replied, but wasn't entirely sure how to proceed. “Is that a ... hobby?”

She gave him a look like he was crazy and retrieved her knives with little yanks, which he discovered he found very attractive. Her skirt was to the ground and the overskirt gathered its thick fabric to the side like a drapery, and within her corset he could see the curve and bend of whalebone underneath the broadcloth seams. It moved and gave almost in tandem with her movements, but not entirely, resisting her torso not stubbornly, but like a dance. Beneath it she wore a thin white top and he was suddenly intensely aware of how differently human women dressed than elves.

She tossed her hair back and looked at him with her hands on her hips, all three knives gracefully spread in one fist.

“Where are you going?” she asked him.

“I'm not sure,” he replied immediately and honestly.

“Can I come?”

“What?”

“Elves are hard of hearing, too?”

“No, it's just, why would you ask that?”

“Because I'm bored.”

“You don't even know me.”

“You don't know me, either.”

“You're not answering my question.”

“I thought I already did.”

So it was that Al'bert had to quickly decide whether or not bringing this young woman with him would be useful or if she would try to knife him in the night.

“Do you...” he began, then changed directions. “Is there anything else you can do?”

She looked bemused and offended, but after considering him, she nodded and began sheathing her weapons.

“Yes, I am a healer.”

Al'bert blinked.

“You're hired.”

Chapter 25 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:08:00 +0000

XXV

War entered the consciousness of Schloeffelonia like a motif. Fang gradually sharpened his native country into a blade, but it was a blade made of weak metal, for he was despised by his own people.

The point of that blade was Zedwig, whose unique talents made Schloeffelonia unstoppable. Zedwig was, without question, the most powerful weapon anyone had ever beheld, and once wielded by the intense focus of Fang he became something that was terrible.

The first city that Fang decided to attack, being the Narmans, reacted with disbelief to the missive sent from Schloeffelonia demanding surrender. It was a human city, as most of them were, which controlled the ports on the western sea, and when it failed to reply with unconditional surrender after the time allotted, Fang attacked. It was questionable whether or not Fang actually wished for the city to surrender prior to being attacked, because he seemed to be plainly giddy for violence the day the siege began.

The day the siege began was also the day the siege ended.

A missive was sent to Fang, and it was mostly one of polite disconnect, from a leader of Narman City who believed the new overlord was either confused or delirious, the contents of which could be boiled down to something similar to: “What brought this on?” and “More discussion, please”. Fang, being the aggressive, sensational sort he was, couldn’t abide by any negotiations and set the armies to attack.

The great gates of Narman City were adorned with classically beautiful sculptures depicting fanciful creatures that might best be described as being of the mer- variety and artfully sculpted pieces of ships, and they closed that morning with a large crash which sounded of bewilderment and necessity. Unfortunately, it didn’t matter what they did with the gates, since Zedwig and the mages could conquer the city within using merely the air itself.

The vast army of Fang, Overlord of Darkness approached the outer walls with pikes that, as the soldiers walked, swayed lightly in a way that brought tall, thin reeds to mind. Taken as a whole, they looked fine and delicate, as if a hand brushed across them would make the majority perhaps bend as if in a breeze, or break and fall aside, left to blow away like dust. Individually, they were sharp, thick, and piercing.

In occasional places, but patterned well enough to be intentional, there were brilliant green flags hoisted on long poles which were pulled at jealously by the wind. They popped and shuddered as the wind tore at them, but despite all efforts they would not tear.

Fang rode at the front of the army, fearless and confident, upon a gray and black horse. He wore black, which contrasted with his pale skin and hair in a stark and demanding way. Near his right hand rode Zedwig, who, beside the cruelty of Fang, appeared fair and golden as if a pocket of mercy had somehow survived in the midst of sharp brutality.

Upon closer inspection, though, Zedwig’s delicate face held subtle but unmistakable clues towards his inner torment. He was a lamb being led to the slaughter. He was waiting, biding his time, unable to think about what might happen next. He knew, somewhere and somehow, what it was Fang would ask of him, but avoided thinking about it in order to preserve another rare moment without anguish.

The rest of the mages walked behind them, relegated to the role of accessories, as Zedwig, through the bearing of Fang in relation to the Chief Mage, was clearly the Overlord’s favorite beyond any doubt.

Near the outer wall of Narman City Fang stopped, and the rest of the army stopped with him. Within the walls and within the army, anxiety and expectation hung heavy and thick in the air and the feeling of mortality seeped into the groundwater of many bones. In that moment, the fate of thousands of men hung like a delicate garment upon the desires of one, who considered the wall and then turned to look at his mage.

Zedwig saw the thrill of power in Fang as their eyes met and he felt fear.

“Dismount,” Fang told him, and he did. Fang also left his horse and walked beside Zedwig, and the two stood at the forefront of the army like the tiny point of a chevron and regarded the city with two very different expressions.

The Chief Mage gazed with melancholy upon the city of Narman and decided that whatever Fang required of him, he would spare the art that adorned the great gate.

“Zedwig,” said Fang at last. “Gather the mages and make this city kneel before me.”

Inherently, Zedwig knew exactly what Fang wanted of him, and his obedience clicked into place like clockwork. As the gears began to crank into place, he drew the other mages under his complete power and began to order them with emotionless efficiency. Part of him was locked to one side and the other, compassionate and horrified, stayed locked to the other side. Neither side interfered with the other; neither side could interfere with the other as nothing was allowed to stop his complete compliance with what Fang wanted.

Within him the magic built, blue, searing, and exalting. He hated what he was doing, and he loathed Fang for forcing him to do it, but there was a pleasure that came from working with this destructive force, however dark. To force what was around him to bend to his will through his own power satisfied something deep within him which caused the rest of his mind to recoil. It threatened to overwhelm the rest of him, but couldn’t touch the cold pool of water that Gaffer had placed within him. He retreated to safety, and Fang ruled him at large.

It was as if he was inhaling, but instead of air, it was magic. He eyed the gate, and in particular one statue that had been sculpted with rare perfection of balance. It was of a mermaiden, one arm stretched to the side, as if welcoming, and the other above her in a careless gesture of incidental grace. Her face was delicate, effortless, and timeless. He didn’t want her to die.

Fang glowed with power beside him that ebbed with a pulse like a heartbeat. Zedwig had sparsely drawn from him out of spite, instead preferring to draw from everywhere else, anywhere else, but him. However, as the power grew within the mage and began to coalesce into shape, Fang moved closer and began to blind Zedwig’s senses as he’d done before. As if Zedwig was dying of thirst and kneeling beside a stream, it tempted him painfully to be aware of such immense power and not draw from it, as it was offered freely and openly like a bounty. Fang didn’t require that he draw from him; he merely stood nearby and allowed it to overwhelm Zedwig.

Still, Zedwig resisted for a time, and began the assault under the explicit direction that the mermaiden not be harmed. It didn’t really make a difference whether or not the mermaiden fell to pieces or not in regards to the fate of those within the city and the fate of the gate itself, but for Zedwig, it gave him at least a very small measure of beauty to preserve in the midst of what he was forced to do.

There was no outward indication or signal from the elf mages that could be construed as an order, per se, but all at once a volley of fireballs erupted from their ranks in perfect unison, with Zedwig’s leading the rest like a fiery phoenix at the head of a burning V. They shot upward with surprising silence, making great, calculated arcs through the sky, spreading, and falling with weight and precision into the city. Again the elf mages, thirty strong, shot a blinding round into the heart of the city, and a third time.

They stopped.

For a long moment the army stood in silence. Occasionally Zedwig could hear one of the humans behind him clearing his throat, or the chink of weapons and armor moving against itself, but mostly what was prevalent was the sound of green fabric pulled by the wind and expectations.

Gradually, they began to see it; small, delicate flames like budding flowers licked above the top of the city wall until they were followed by black billows of smoke and finally grew to maturity and intense strength. Zedwig was certain surrender couldn’t be far from coming, for most of the city seemed to be in flames. Somewhere distant, he was sorry.

Fang came close beside him.

“Force open the gate,” he told the mage, his green eyes upon the beautifully sculpted art which adorned them.

Zedwig looked at him, aware that “open the gates” actually meant to “destroy the gates”.

“Fangline,” Zedwig said. He refused to call him anything but what he knew Fang to be, and that was always Fangline. Fang, for his part, never once corrected him, and if Zedwig had been aware of it, he would have known the incident to be singular and to irritate nearly everyone else who observed the familiarity with which the overlord allowed the mage. Fang used him like a tool but treated him with more kindness than anyone in the world. It was all lost on Zedwig, who was given the absolute best but absolute worst of all things in the Empire of Schloeffelonia and was always miserable. As he called his name now, Fang’s attention was diverted directly onto the mage.

“They aren’t even resisting,” said Zedwig. “We have won and anything more is completely unnecessary!”

Fang gave him a steady look; it was a placid façade, for after only a few moments his impatience suddenly broke through.

“You will open the gate, Zedwig,” he ordered him. “You will tear it from the wall, until there is nothing left but rubble!”

At this, Zedwig was forced to comply. Calling the mages to arms, another volley was released into the gates, with the specific, silent instruction to preserve the mermaiden. The gates shuddered and the ground trembled subtly, but they had withstood the impact. A sculpted ship had fallen to the ground, crashing into pieces of simple rock.

Zedwig drew magic from everywhere, he inhaled and it flowed through the ground into him. He gloried in it, taking a brief respite in the simplicity of how it felt to teem with life for only a few moments. The air that floated around him gave him particles of life, the sturdy ground gave him streams, the unknowing soldiers behind him filled his veins with it, and the ethereal skies lent him its mysterious beams. He closed his eyes and mixed it all within him, being himself and being everything around him all at once. Still, there beside him Fang burned, waiting, and largely untapped.

“Fire,” he thought, and fireballs erupted from them all, whisking through the air, growing and smaller and smaller to them but greater and greater to the waiting gates. There was an explosion and the great gates groaned long and loudly, but they did not open. Smoke was billowing in great swaths from the city, now, making it seem as if the whole of it must be engulfed, and Zedwig watched anxiously for the blackness to clear from in front of the gates. It was still there, the sculpture, although slightly blackened from cinders. The face of the mermaiden looked oblivious and beautiful.

He knew that under the force of one more strike the gates would be open, so again he drew power to him, pulling it from everywhere, and held onto it for a time. There wasn’t really any reason to move quickly; the city was entirely defenseless and hadn’t shown any indication of fighting back. Moreover, the army was outside of the range of any possible archer or catapult. He focused on the center point of the gates, letting the life force travel through him with a familiar, pleasant frequency, back and forth.

It was at these times that Zedwig felt distant from that which plagued him. This distance was relief and oasis-like against the misery of his condition, and though he’d rather not be doing this at all, he had to hold onto what brief solace he could. While so occupied with the magic he possessed, he wasn’t aware that Fang had come close enough to touch him.

Fang did touch him, a fact of which Zedwig was immediately aware, even though it was only his fingers on the outside of his arm, for his powers as a magnifier were exponentially stronger when he was touching the subject he chose to magnify. There he dwelt on the edge of Zedwig’s senses, still not insistent, but only waiting, as if tarrying behind a veil, but coursing with blinding energy Zedwig could feel.

Fang’s fingers slid around his arm and he grasped it, and in that moment Zedwig was overcome. He began to take from the depthless well of force that was in Fang but with only a brief moment of caution before drawing forcefully and with what seemed to be an unquenchable thirst and even fury for more power. Perhaps it was the anger inside of him that began to act now, for instead of refusing to draw from Fang, he now wanted to drain him entirely, supposing perhaps if he took enough force from him, maybe he could take his life as well.

Zedwig absorbed power until he was filled to the verge of being entirely transparent with light. He was furious and he was ravaging. If he had been cognizant, he would have known Fang was near collapse beside him, but he was only aware of his great power and fury and that which filled his sights at an unfortunate pinpoint; the great gate.

He released the entirety of his madness at the gates, only wanting to destroy, shred, and tear. The other mages released fireballs as well, but they were candlelight beside his streaking white-hot swath of fire. It tore across the space and landed squarely into the gates, tearing them from the walls, and even tearing part of the wall down as well. The gates flew backwards, tilting and oblique, shards of wood and metal spun through the air in high arcs, stones from the wall fell slowly, then with greater speed until finally crashing into the trembling ground.

There was nothing left of the great Narman gate but a gaping hole. As the red fury cleared from Zedwig’s eyes, he knew the mermaiden was gone forever. He was miserable, all the more for the brief, fleeting glory he’d just felt. Nothing he did was lasting; all he did was destroy.

Fang had left him. He was standing about a yard away, in a coat of tailored black brocade hung about with a cloak of velvet. He looked perfect, content, and quietly resigned as he gazed at the ruined city that burned before them. There was occasionally the sound of nervous laughter or a cough from the humans in the army behind them, who could not comprehend and doubtless feared greatly the power of the elves. Mostly, however, they were silent, waiting for orders and grateful to be on this side of the war.[1]

[1] This scene is roughly outlined in page #331-#333.

Chapter 24 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:07:00 +0000

XXIV

“Al’bert, I require that you find him,” said Fang, whilst in the throne room.

“Indeed?” asked Al’bert, who was feigning ignorance. He knew exactly what it was that Fang wanted him to do. He wanted Al’bert to go out in the world, find Prince Sangwine, and kill him. This is one of the last things that Al’bert actually wanted to do. The idea of killing anyone gave him a very unpleasant feeling right in the center of his stomach, and even more someone whom he had known since childhood. Besides, he didn’t really dislike Sangwine so much as he’d found him annoying. Regardless, Fang pressed him.

It had displeased Fang greatly that one part of his meticulously laid plan didn’t work, and his brother was still alive somewhere, although in exile and not likely to return. For as long as Sangwine stayed alive, Fang couldn’t claim complete and total dominion over the throne of Schloeffelonia, and Al’bert knew Fang well enough to know that would bother him incessantly until it was resolved.

“I’d like to find Geeves, as well,” muttered Fang. “I don’t believe it to be coincidence that he should disappear shortly after his plan failed to kill Sangwine.”

“Well, that’s Geeves, right?” said Al’bert wryly. “He always was good at that sort of thing.”

“Doubtless he knew Sangwine would survive it all along,” said Fang.

“Or at least hoped,” added Al’bert.

“Whose side are you on, anyway?” asked Fang with a sharp glance.

Al’bert chuckled, but Fang wasn’t in the mood for humor, and it gave Al’bert a brief pang for the lighter past.

In the throne room there was a throne upon a dais that was carved of wood and polished, behind which was a red tapestry of the house of Schloeffel. Upon this dais stood Fang, and nearby was Zedwig, who rarely left Fang’s presence anymore. The mage generally looked like an egg about to crack, but Al’bert had a tendency to pretend he wasn’t there, not so much to intentionally ignore him, but because his unpleasant situation made Al’bert decidedly uncomfortable about where Fang was heading. For now, though, the Fromages were faring decidedly well in the new Schloeffelonia.

“You know where my loyalties lie, Fang.”

“Then find some help and get rid of Sangwine,” said Fang.

“Right away, then,” he replied, bowing and leaving like a swift breeze.

Outside, he stepped into sunlight, which was the same sunlight that had fallen on Schloeffelonia a month ago, or so it seemed. In actuality, it wasn’t the same sunlight at all, but was entirely different and individual, and would only warm it on this day, in this place, and in this particular way. How did it differ from the last rays the king saw fall upon the stones here on that day? It was long, long ago. It was only a month ago. No, it was only a moment ago.

The change had been vast. The humans from Rascaline seemed to relish their new position as rulers over the elves, which they ruled under the leadership of Fang, all except the nobility that had backed Fang’s ascension. The elves were side-blinded by what had happened; it seemed impossible, but still it was what had happened. There had been outbreaks of rebellion here and there, as the elves initially had seen it as something that must be a joke. However, where the numbers of human soldiers couldn’t suppress mutiny, the mages under the control of Zedwig who was in turn under the control of Fang could and did suppress them swiftly and with terrible judgment.

Now, as it had finally begun to sink into the common collective of the elves that they had been overturned and conquered, Fang turned his eyes to the world outside of Schloeffelonia.

Al’bert found it all dubious. He had always thought Fang was an extraordinarily interesting individual, which was part of the reason he’d been his best friend from the first they’d known each other, but it seemed to him as if all of this Fang was doing was a little much. Actually, he thought it was quite a bit too much. However, it looked as if everything was coming up roses for Fang, although the overlord didn’t seem very happy about it at all.

Perhaps Fang would find something that would give him happiness out there, Al’bert thought, looking at the mountains that formed the border of Schloeffelonia and was where he was ultimately headed. First, though, he went home.

Outside of the estate, Camilla waited. They’d both gained a certain sobriety from the reality of what had happened to their country, as everyone had. Lightheartedness seemed to have no place here, in general, and though Al’bert was normally a very lighthearted individual, even he was relatively subdued of late.

It was afternoon when his horse came over the last bend in the road to bring him in full view of his home. There was a light breeze in the air, and the leaves on nearby branches seemed pale yellow-green and translucent, golden and rare, and they made the sound of a small brook in the wind. He could see Camilla sitting beside the gate, small and insignificant, but deeply significant. She was wearing plum.

He dismounted and she came to embrace him.

“Our overlord is well?” she asked in a stilted way.

“Oh, right as rain, really,” he replied, busying himself with his horse and trying to stall telling her that which he didn’t wish to tell her. “He seems to be settling in well. I think he’s going to attack Narman City next month unless the snows come early.”

“Attack it? Why?” asked Camilla, who, like most of the elves, found offensive military action an entirely foreign concept.

“To conquer it, of course,” Al’bert told her breezily and he led his horse into the stable. Camilla followed him, looking concerned. “Don’t worry, he’ll be quite victorious.”

“And what does he require of you, Al’bert?” she asked him.

Al’bert sighed as the inevitable had come to pass. He looked at her.

“I’m being sent to dispatch Sangwine.”

“Can’t he send anyone else to do that?” she asked, looking angry.

“Apparently not,” he said, in a resigned sort of way. Then, the shadow of his gregarious self passed across his face. “Think of it this way,” he said. “You’ll get the estate all to yourself while I’m gone.”

“I will be agonizingly lonely,” she replied.

“I will write you letters,” he said. “Letters upon letters. You won’t have room to store them all.”

“It won’t be enough,” she sighed, wan and morose.

“You’ll have your dozens of suitors to fill your hours,” he said to her.

“I hate them all,” she replied petulantly.

“Then what can I do?” he asked her, at a loss.

Camilla was suddenly and singularly overcome, so instead of saying anything else to her brother, she only hugged him, inhaled his scent, and hoped to remember it well.

Chapter 23 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:07:00 +0000

XXIII

It was later, perhaps much later, perhaps only an hour later that Zedwig found himself retching amongst the shrubbery in the royal gardens. Perhaps they were not to be called the “royal gardens” anymore, but merely the “overlord gardens”. He had killed twenty-seven men he knew today, he had wielded dark, destructive magic, he had watched as the king and his sister were brutally murdered, and it made him feel as if he were coated with an oily filth which couldn’t be sloughed off no matter what he did.

Somehow, Fangline had gained complete control over him to where he couldn’t dictate his own actions were they not in line with Fangline’s wishes. Fangline was harder, cruel and unfeeling. He was a smooth stone before, but now he was a rock that had been broken to reveal sharp, cutting edges. Zedwig was entirely and completely in shock, and so was everyone else. In one day, everything was wholly different. No one was free anymore, and of all those who had lost freedom, Zedwig was paramount.

Fang, or so he had insisted he be called, had allowed Zedwig a brief solace alone in the gardens to allow his shock to wear off. He couldn’t leave the gardens, for Fang forbade it. Attempting to do anything against Fang’s command was impossible; Schloefflonia’s new overlord ruled his mind and he could not change it.

If Zedwig’s consciousness wasn’t plastered motionless with shock against the horrors of what he’d seen just an hour past, he might have rued what he had done for that brief time in years past with Fangline, for if he had never allowed the untoward study to take place back then, none of this would have happened now. Little did he know back then, as he had gloried in his own strength, that he was trifling with a sleeping dragon which would one day wake and bind him ruthlessly in the chains of a previously unimagined hell.

However, Zedwig would have months and even years to consider all of this in every way possible. He would indeed rue it, regret it, and suffer for it beyond what he believed he could endure, and then it would begin again. For now, though, his mind was almost blank with disbelief and he found himself weeping and noticing the beautiful way the small leaves grew along the length of an unassuming branch on the bush beside his head. He wept over the loss of those he was supposed to protect; he wept over the beauty of the world. It made no sense, but he was on his hands and knees and grateful he wasn’t heaving anymore.

From behind a hedge the gardener made a noise. Zedwig heard him, but couldn’t see him, so he, in his desperate and numb state, crawled to the edge and looked around it. Gaffer was sitting among a bunch of daffodils with his legs crossed, and was looking at the sky. His hat was balanced on his knee, and his face was full of sorrow. The gardener perceived the mage, and looked down at Zedwig, disheveled and on his knees beside the hedge.

“We’ve never seen anythin’ like this, have we Zedwig?”

“No,” replied Zedwig quietly and simply, but wondering on the gardener’s aspect, seeming somehow more comforting than that which he recalled, which was an unassuming old man with hedge clippers who wasn’t memorable for anything except always being there.

Gaffer seemed to be wondering on him, too, for he was regarding him very intently.

“It isn’t an easy thing that’s been done to yeh,” said Gaffer. “Nobody’s gonna blame yeh for it.”

At this, Zedwig fell to tears, for he blamed himself entirely. The wretchedness of his existence crashed against him, and the inexpressible beauty of the daffodils tore at him. He was torn, ripped asunder; the depths of darkness which he’d been plunged into over the past hours swung with all the weight of a tremendous, unstoppable pendulum and opened to his sight the intense brilliance and perfection of creation falling out of his reach. It was nearly more than any mortal could bear and his sanity began to slip away from him.

Gaffer sat patiently as Zedwig fought and failed to regain his composure.

“I’ll give yeh somethin’,” he said gently, at last.

When Zedwig looked up, Gaffer had moved and was standing above him, his hoary head framed by the blazing sky. He put his hand on the mage’s head and something happened within Zedwig. It was as if a draught of cool water seeped into his mind, forming a pool of relief and solace. Gaffer took his hand away.

“Now, yeh’ll always have somewhere t’go,” he said with a sort of smile that made Zedwig feel as if he hadn’t been forgotten. Then, putting his hat on, he went back and sat in the daffodils with finality.

Feeling a little disoriented, but with gratitude and relief, Zedwig withdrew from the garden, if only because it seemed his time had ended there and it was time for something else to begin. Fang was waiting, and since it was inevitable that Zedwig would have to comply with his wishes, it was with bravery that he gathered himself to meet with him again.

Chapter 22 (of 43)

colbycheese@gmail.com (Colby) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:05:00 +0000

XXII

Zedwig’s life had become very pleasantly normal over the past two years. He’d never before realized how much he appreciated the basic simplicity of his life, which was spent in research, instruction, and pursuing the subject he loved more than anything else: magic.

Of course, after feeling he had learned the hard way, he never went near destructive magic again and resolved to keep away from it for the rest of his life. No one ever knew what he had done, and he was inclined to let it die a quiet death.

In the meantime, he continued to radiate the promise and talent he’d always had, in greater and greater proportion to what had come before. He began writing his own books of theory on various subjects within magic and force, and overall lived a humble life.

Fangline had changed something within him, though, which was not there before. He was now far more outgoing than he had been before and waxed stronger in his confidence when dealing with others. He had even begun to grow attached to a young maid who was in charge of cleaning his library. Whether he was attached to her before his experience with Fangline or not isn’t really important; what became important was that he was no longer too timid to talk to her.

They had developed a gradual repertoire of conversation, and eventually it became fairly normal for her to arrange her schedule to be about her duties when he was present. They were still both shy, regardless of Zedwig’s change, and progress was painfully slow. However, for the life of an elf, progress can be torturously slow and it doesn’t matter.

On this particular day, Zedwig was attempting to look as if he was working on one of his books, and she was taking a very long time to meticulously dust the volumes nearby. He gave up, eventually, and merely watched her for a while, she being entirely unaware he was doing so.

“I wonder, Miss Fairsienne,” he said, breaking the silence. “If I could enchant your duster to do the work for you.”

She turned with a blink, looking surprised. Then, she laughed.

“Mage Zedwig, I can’t imagine it would be very effective.”

“Are you questioning my ability to enchant a feather duster?”

She laughed again. “How could a feather duster truly know where there is dust to be dusted, however enchanted it may be?”

Zedwig stood, considering himself challenged.

“Why don’t we find out?” he asked her.

Fairsienne gave him a sidelong glance and handed her duster to the mage. He took it, gave her a clandestine smile that she found very amusing, and then began gazing at it ponderously.

“Such deep thought for a feather duster,” she said bemusedly, although he knew she was secretly admiring the use of his skill, which he also knew she could hardly begin to understand.

His thought fell deeper and he drew life from all around himself, and, noting her gentle, delicate force nearby, he only drew modestly from her out of respect, although he was certain she wouldn’t discern it. He wielded the force he gathered in ways it was willing to go, sculpting it into beauty in a way that was almost like asking it if it would like to animate a feather duster, today. It was like a dance, requiring two to create, himself, and the overlying force that ruled the universe and gave it life. The motes he wielded settled into the duster, and it glowed briefly, then the handle rose of its own accord.

Fairsienne clapped her hands delightedly.

“Oh, look!” she cried. “You did it!”

“Did I?” he wondered, pondering the duster as it levitated itself, hovering between them without being held. He addressed it. “Dust the shelves, would you?”

It left them and began dusting the shelves in a more or less mechanical way, and with not nearly the care or delicacy that Miss Fairsienne put into the task.

“It certainly works faster than you,” said Zedwig slyly. Fairsienne laughed and pushed him out of false spite, but as they both knew why she lingered, this became present in their minds and time slowed. The duster continued dusting like a metronome just out of sight as he looked at her and she was blushing. He moved, and at that moment, a book fell off of the shelf beside them due to the intense dusting of the enchanted feather duster.

Both of them were surprised by the sudden bang of a book hitting the floor, followed by a moment’s giddiness over having been surprised by anything in the first place. Zedwig asked the duster to stop, and it did, immediately growing docile and at rest like a tame animal.

“I think it lacks a certain gentleness you possess,” he said to Fairsienne while holding the feather duster. Then, with a sigh, he relented, “Alas, I have failed you.”

He gave her the duster as a knight offers a sword to a queen, and she was endeared to him. She touched his hand as she took it, lingering meaningfully but with uncertainty until he took her hand and moved towards her.

At this time, when their attention was focused with such intensity in the space between them, the library, the palace, and the world faded and whole universes passed around them with the possibilities the next moment held. He was very close to her; close enough that he could kiss her. It was an idea that sent light coursing through his limbs, and he knew he must. Then Geeves came in.

They broke apart with much embarrassment.

“Chief Mage Zedwig, Prince Fangline has returned,” said the butler.

A powerful jolt traveled entirely throughout Zedwig. It was one of thrill, excitement, nausea, and dread.

“Prince Fangline? After all this time?” said Zedwig, for lack of anything useful to say. Nausea seemed to be winning out among the feelings he was wracked with at the moment and he tried very hard to maintain an unaffected outward appearance.

“Yes,” said Geeves simply, not offering another word of explanation. Even for Geeves, this reply was strangely clipped. Then, the butler went on.

“His Majesty-,” and Geeves’ voice seemed to catch. “Has requested that you be a part of the party which will welcome him outside the palace.”

Zedwig knew why. It was called a “welcoming party”, but it was actually a precaution. He assumed there would be quite a few guards, as well. It brought him a small bit of melancholy that the king showed even this much distrust in his own son’s intentions, but decided he must have reason for it. However, Geeves was behaving very oddly.

“Are you well, Geeves?” asked Zedwig.

“I’m fine, thank you,” he replied, and he quit the room.

Zedwig took only a brief moment to bid Fairsienne good-bye, with an unspoken assurance they would continue later where they had left off, and made his way with nervous haste to the outside courtyard of the palace. There were guards already, followed by the king, his sister, and Geeves. Zedwig took his place at the front of them all, like a slender guard dog, well trained and docile, but watching.

Everyone fell silent.

The sun filtered through the leaves, down, down to the stones that paved the path and passed across them, light and careless, transient and brief.[1]

[1] Page #293 for intermittent events between these two chapters.