The Fire and the Storm - Metric Pro Edition: Fiction, Dragons, Elves, Unicorns, Magic (58 page)

“I see.” Zarkog noted in Common, and chuckled a bit, emitting some smoke from his nostrils.  “I’m surprised that you seem to share my opinion of The Just Alliance, considering your parentage.”

“The Just Alliance is a fine thing, but it was formed in response to the unjust and unnecessary killing and destruction that
you
initiated, and the War of The Founding was a huge and unnecessary waste.” Fire retorted.  “Aside from the fact that every death in the war was a needless tragedy to everyone who lost someone close to them, there’s the fact that everyone who died in the war will
not
be fighting the demons.  Though the combatants and civilians killed on both sides were small portions of the totals, it still means that almost two hundred thousand fighters will be missing from our military, and that’s a significant force!

“As to forcing the vow of justice on those who had no wish to swear it, it had to be done.  But everyone in The Just Alliance knows that it was the best of a list of very bad choices, and it would have been better avoided.”

“I see.” Zarkog nodded, and turned to her two siblings.  “And what are your personal reasons for wishing to speak with me?”

“I’m here to see that you’ve been sufficiently punished for the deaths of my paternal grandparents, and my aunt and uncle.” Val bluntly announced.  “We’ve been told that you’ve been punished, and that the sentence was agreed upon by a great circle of justicers, and by the surviving relatives of those who were killed in your try for global domination.  But that sentence has not been made public, and it seems to me that you’ve suffered no punishment at all that I can see.  If I find that your punishment is insufficient to satisfy my sense of justice, I’ll seek to punish you further.”

“What audacity.” Zarkog snorted.  “I’m tempted to let you think that I
have
been mildly punished, just to satisfy my curiosity as to how such a tiny person who appears to be less than ten years of age could possibly think to inflict any punishment upon me, of any sort.

“But the temptation is small.  So, in order to satisfy your sense of justice, I’ll allow you to Read my physical sensations.”

Val did so in a blink, then cringed a bit, despite her best efforts to resist the urge to do so.  Her companions were looking to her expectantly, so she told them.  “He’s in a great deal of pain.  It’s constantly changing and affects every part of his body.”

She considered the great black dragon again, then told him.  “I’m surprised you can still function.  You must have a great deal of self-control.”

“Yes I do, but in this case it makes no difference.” Zarkog returned.  “The pain is an automated spell, and its severity is always enough to
almost
incapacitate me.  On days when my will is stronger, the pain increases until it is almost more than I can stand.  When my resistance is less, the pain decreases until I am again fully able to function.  But just barely.

“I will suffer this for twenty years.  Though the situation is to my benefit, I consider it an incredible stupidity that The Just Alliance let me live.  To allow a conquered but formidable enemy such as myself to remain a danger to them was the height of strategic foolishness on their part.”

“So I suppose that you must not have considered any of the dragons and Sylvan in Serminak to be formidable, either singularly or severally, since you let them all live.” Val stated, with a touch of derision.

“That is correct.”

“Well I’ll have you know that my father might just have let you die.  No one knows if he would have or not, not even him.  You live because Visinniria, Elven Goddess of War, suggested that he spare your life, on the grounds that you may prove useful.  I agree with the assessment.  To quote you, killing you would have been a waste of a useful tool that can be repaired.  I’m certain that you’re destined to kill a great many demons, and for now, that’s all that really matters.

“You may think that someday you’ll overcome your vow of justice and take revenge upon us all, even though you’re sworn on The Truthstone of Falgaroth.  Even though Falgaroth, Eighth God of Unicorns, poured his power into the stone for tens of thousands of years, in order to ensure that it would be binding on the gods themselves.  Any hope you may entertain of escaping the vow is futile, and even if you did, it would do you no good.

“The Withdrawal is ended, and all the gods of Kellaran live among us as fully-sworn justice-bound members of The Just Alliance.  Your loss to my father decided that.  Even if you could overcome all of The Just Alliance, including all the gods of Kellaran, you’d then have to face all the people and gods of the Triax.  They’re the sworn allies of The Just Alliance, and I’d guess they’re pretty tough, considering they’ve been hunting worlds full of demons out in the great void for eons.

“No, I’d say that in relation to those you’d face if you succeeded in attempting to rebel against The Just Alliance, you aren’t significantly formidable.  They’re quite safe in letting you live.”

“Perhaps.” was Zarkog’s only reply to that, then he looked to Six.  “And what is it that you want with me?”

“I’m here to tell you that we’re offering you a chance to redeem yourself.” the boy replied.

“We believe in the meritocracy system of the giants, and we think that The Just Alliance’s present military command structure may prove unwieldy in the war we’re facing with the demons.  We intend to propose the greatest tournament that Kellaran has ever seen, with the prize being nothing less than the rule of The Just Alliance.

“We think we can lead this world in warfare against the demons more effectively than anyone else, and we want a chance to prove it.  In order to ensure that there’s no favoritism toward us, we’re not going to ask Quewanak to referee the tournament and set the scenario that will be our arena.  We’re going to ask Amirgath.

“If this goes ahead, he’ll compose a simulated scenario of warfare with the demons, to take place all over the world and out in the void as well.  Each competitor or team of competitors will fight exactly the same scenario, with exactly the same conditions, in command of The Just Alliance.  Whoever has the best result at the end of the scenario gets to rule the alliance, at least until the demons are dealt with.  There should be another tournament with a peacetime scenario to see who’ll rule after that.

“There are a lot of people who realize that you very well could have ended up ruling Kellaran if you’d played things differently.  Regardless of your past crimes, there’s nothing in your sentence that says you can’t still rule The Just Alliance if everyone agrees with it.  If you really are the best, and you really can lead us against the demons better than anyone else, then I want you in command.  If you’re not the best, but you don’t compete in the tournament, the winner will lack complete credibility.  There’d always be someone saying that you’d have won it if you’d competed.

“And there’s another thing.  If we’re still alive after the war with the demons here, we plan to go with the Triax to hunt the demons throughout the great void, hopefully to eventually destroy their homeworld and exterminate them completely.  I’d like to have you with us in that venture, and if you place higher in the tournament than anyone else who’s coming with us, then I want you in command.”

“Well.” Zarkog said as he sat up on his haunches like a dog.  “Now you have surprised me.  Twice.

“On the matter of hunting demons in the void after they are eliminated from our sun system, you’ll have to ask me then.  My decision will depend on what occurs between now and then.

“As to the tournament to rule Kellaran; if you can truly cause such a thing to occur as you have described it, be assured that I will indeed participate.  And I would be in your debt.”

He paused for a long moment as he considered the four young beings before him.  “It is difficult to believe that any of you are as young as you seem.  And you truly believe that you would win the tournament, and prove yourselves most capable of ruling Kellaran?”

“We do.” Six nodded.

Just then Amirgath and Quewanak appeared hovering above them, then landed on the mountaintop, and both dragon gods were grinning.

“You’ll get your chance, impetuous youth!” Amirgath laughed, shaking the mountain with his thunderous mirth.  “Of course we’ve been listening since we were mentioned, and we both think your tournament is a fine idea!  We’ll both co-operate on conducting and judging the tournament, and we’ll likely recruit a few more gods from every faction to assist with it, so that the scenario can be justifiably complex while allowing the tournament to be completed in a reasonable amount of time.

“We can’t say if The Assembly of The Just Alliance or the populous of Kellaran will agree to naming the winner the ruler of all, but we will most certainly hold the tournament!

“The tournament will be held in six weeks, which will be two days after the time-bubbles end.  Those in the time-bubbles will not be informed of it until forty days before they re-emerge, so they’ll have the same six weeks in which to prepare, should any of them wish to compete.

“Be aware that while in the scenario, only the declared members of the competing team will be able to contribute creativity.  Every other person on Kellaran will be represented in the scenario, but they’ll strive only to obey your orders as exactly and as literally as possible.”

“As it should be.” Zarkog nodded.

Falgaroth and Visinniria appeared.

“It’ll be an interesting project.” Visinniria stated to Six with a smile.  “I wonder, what limitations would you place on the number of members of a competing team, and what assistance would you allow each team to receive from others?”

“What Amirgath said about only having team members make decisions during the scenario parallels our thinking on the subject.” Six told her.  “But we envisioned allowing the teams to get any assistance they can get to train and prepare for the tournament, including the assistance and training of the gods, if they can get it.  We planned on asking Quewanak’s help to complete our training.  We estimate that we need about six years of training in his dream-time to maximize our present potential for the task, and he can do that for us in an hour or so of real time.  But if others want to do more, we welcome them to do so.  If they wish to spend a million years inside a reverse-stasis field to train for it, that’s fine.  We’d take more than the six years if we though it would do any good, but I doubt it would.  It’s just diminishing returns after that.  We mostly just want it so we can familiarize ourselves with the characteristics of the commanders and troops we’ll be commanding.”

“It’d be different if we knew exactly what the war with the demons will really be like,” Fire stated,  “Then it’d be worth it to practice for it a million times.  But since we don’t know, over-training would just reduce our effectiveness after a while.  So there’s no need to wait to tell those in the time-bubbles about the tournament.  Let them train for it the whole time if they want.”

“Very well.” Amirgath chuckled, then told Zarkog; “If you want my help with your training, I will give it.”

“And I will accept it, my Lord.” Zarkog acknowledged with a nod.

“The composition of teams may be problematic.”
Falgaroth stated with a toss of his long blue mane and a shake of his horn. 
“For instance; I am certain that Emperor Osbald of Thon will wish to enter a team under his overall command, and that he will want Empress Emeroth of Verzaclon and Overlord Senchak of Kletiuk on his team as consulting members.  But it is also certain that both of those monarchs will wish to form teams under their own command, and will want to include the other two on their teams as consulting members.”

“Then let them.” Six said with a shrug.  “Let each individual who wants to lead a team do so, and if someone is chosen to be a subordinate member of more than one team, then the only thing that should constrain them from serving on every team they’re invited to is the tournament organizers’ ability to manage the scheduling and the logistics.  The same’s true of the number of teams you’ll allow to compete.  You may wish to set some minimum qualifications for entrants, so you don’t waste your time with entrants who have no real hope of winning.  But I think that every team that has any real chance at winning should be allowed to compete, if it’s practical to hold the tournament with that many entrants.  Same with the permitted number of team members.  If you can handle the complexity of it, let each team leader have as many team members as they wish.

“The only important thing is that we have the most provably capable command team in place when we fight the demons.  All else is details.  And beyond that, I truly respect the determination of the gods to not control or rule the mortals of Kellaran, but it’s a luxury that we may not always be able to afford.  If it becomes obvious to you in the midst of war that we need you to take command in order to avoid disaster, then I expect you to fulfill your responsibilities and take command.  As I said, we need to have our best where they can do the most good, mortal or divine.  I think the Triax’ culture is very effective that way.”

“Hmph.” Amirgath snorted.  “That may be the first time that a mortal has asked a god to exert authority while having no real religious sentiment, no hero worship, and no emotional exaltation of our power at all.  Simply recognizing that we are more capable, and asking out of practicality.  It’s very refreshing.”

“Meritocracy is the most just method of choosing leadership.” Karz insisted.  “Perhaps in peacetime, the huge difference in power and perception between gods and mortals may make it less practical for the gods to exert direct leadership over mortals.  But those considerations fade to insignificance during warfare for the survival of Kellaran.  Under battle conditions a commander needs to be able to assess, react, communicate, make decisions, and issue commands as quickly as possible and with the greatest awareness possible, and by those criteria, there’s no doubt that the gods should make better commanders than mortals.  Your vast power as spell-casters would be almost irrelevant in that role.”