The Sorcerer's Destiny (The Sorcerer's Path) (3 page)

“
You are not yet prepared. We desire you to experience the full terror and futility of resistance.”

Azerick accepted the Scions’ answer as a partial truth. He held to his theory that the Scions were not going to leave anything to chance and were preparing the board to their advantage. Azerick and Raijaun toiled for an immeasurable amount of time, sealing fractures and walling off lesser breaches until exhaustion finally forced them to leave the Scions’ prison realm. Azerick was unsure of the hour when their consciousness finally returned to his laboratory, but he was certain it was late.

“Raijaun, why don’t you go get something to eat and rest.”

“Do you not need to rest as well, Father?”

“I do, but I cannot. I need to search the Codex for information on creating a Source pool. Lissandra did it, so it must be in there somewhere. Raijaun, I am going to need your help with it. Your full help,” Azerick emphasized.

Raijaun nodded grimly knowing the kind of pain he would endure by wielding all three forms of his magic in concert. “I will do what I must, Father.”

Azerick smiled and squeezed his son’s shoulder. “I know. You always do.”

Raijaun left to get some much-needed rest and food while Azerick opened the Codex Arcana and spread its pages out before him. “I must create a Source pool. Show me.”

The pages fanned and words crawled across the sheets faster than the eye could read, but Azerick’s mind absorbed every word and deciphered their complex and convoluted meaning almost without conscious thought. The Codex held nearly all the answers to every conceivable question regarding magic, but it did not give up its truths easily for it did not think with a mortal mind. Its answers often appeared as riddles to the reader, and the more complex the question the more indecipherable the answer.

It took days for Azerick to compile a coherent method for creating the Source pool, days not eating or sleeping, his only breaks were the times he spent with Raijaun to make repairs to the barrier in a desperate hope of staving off the inevitable invasion by just another day. It was with heavy footsteps that he finally emerged from his studies and joined his friends and family at the dining table.

“I presume your emergence means you have met with some success,” Allister said in welcome as Azerick sat down.

“I have.”

“From what Raijaun has been telling us of the barrier, I understand your grim demeanor, but I suppose there is more bad news at hand.”

“A challenge to be certain. In order to create the Source pool, we need a lot of arcanum to act as a catalyst.”

“How much arcanum?” Aggie asked.

“A thousand pounds.”

“A thousand pounds!” Allister exclaimed. “There likely isn’t a thousand pounds in the entire world!”

Allister’s claim was not far from the truth. The amount of arcanum that went into the construction of Azerick’s staff likely represented a year of mining and refining, assuming the dwarves had found a rich source. Arcanum was not found in thick veins like gold or silver, but scattered specks as if sprinkled by the gods in tiny pinches spread across the whole of the world.

“I discovered a source capable of providing what I require.”

“Where in the world can you possibly find that much arcanum?” Rusty asked.

“The heart of our world is a molten mass of arcanum.”

“No one has ever traveled to the center of the world. It is not possible,” Allister insisted.

“A few have, but only Lissandra and her guardians ever returned. I have discovered the method they used to travel there and can duplicate it.”

“It cannot be as easy as you make it sound.”

“It is not. Something lives at the heart of our world and jealously guards its hoard.”

“What could possibly live down there?” Ellyssa asked.

“I do not know. Not even the Codex was able to share that information.”

Miranda wore a look of worry on her face. “It sounds dangerous.”

“There are elemental forces at work down there that I will have to counter. I expect that to be my biggest challenge.”

“Do you really?”

Azerick slunk a bit into himself. “No, not really.”

“Father, you should let me come with you.”

“No, I need you to stay here and guard the barrier. You will have a great deal to do when I get back. Then it will be my turn to babysit the Scions while you recover.”

“Azerick, are you sure this is a good idea?” Miranda asked beseechingly.

“No, I’m certain it is a terrible idea, but like all my terrible ideas, it is the only one I see.”

Miranda stood. “I can’t do this anymore,” she declared and fled the room, struggling to hold back her tears.

“Miranda…,” Azerick called after her.

Colleen stood and laid a hand on Azerick’s arm. “Stay here. I’ll go after her.” Colleen found Miranda sitting on the sofa, weeping into her hands.

Miranda looked up when Colleen sat next to her. “It’s never going to be okay, is it?”

“Azerick will be fine. He’ll do this and come back.”

“It doesn’t matter. There will always be something else. Even if we survive this invasion, we will never be the way we were. Nothing will.”

Colleen wanted to tell Miranda things would return to normal, that Azerick would settle down and be her husband again once it was all over, but her mouth refused to voice the lie.

***

Azerick held perfectly still as Raijaun carefully painted the silver runes he described onto his body. The arcanum dust tinting the paint was worth a king’s ransom, but it was crucial to allow him to withstand the elemental forces at play at the world’s core. The sigils Raijaun marked him with were largely draconic in origin, and each one had to be perfect and painstakingly drawn. It took hours to complete them all, probably far longer than Azerick would be gone if everything went right.

Azerick had wanted to go to Miranda, but there was nothing he could say or do. He had to do this, just as he had to do so much more. He could promise things would be better afterward, but neither of them believed it. Chances were, there wouldn’t even be an afterward. If he did not do everything he could, it was a certainty.

“I think that is the last of them, Father,” Raijaun announced and corked the small jar containing the last tiny bit of arcanum paint.

Azerick carefully examined himself in the full length mirror and declared Raijaun’s work perfect.

“Are you certain I cannot accompany you?” Raijaun asked, not for the first time.

“You cannot. I need you here.”

Azerick summoned his staff and walked as naked as the day he was born to the chamber he had prepared for the transport, careful not to mar any of the sigils on his body. Clothing would not last long in the hostile environment, and he saw no need in preparing any that could. It was much easier to protect his body which, thanks to Klaraxis’ natural resilience, made the task even simpler.

The sorcerer stepped carefully into the ring of sigils painted onto the floor with the same paint used on his skin. Azerick focused his mind and drew in the Source before feeding it into the runes decorating the floor as well as those on his body. Flesh and stone began to glow with a sliver, eldritch light, and the summoning chamber began to phase out of existence. His stomach leapt into his throat as he experienced the sensation of falling, made even more disconcerting in that it felt so much like his first trip to the abyss.

When the world came back into focus, Azerick found himself in an open plain of solid, rough stone. Rivers of molten magma erupted from the ground and snaked across the rocky landscape before burrowing back into the rock and disappearing. Azerick could sense the titanic pressure and its desire to crush him like the insect he was, as well as the intense heat threatening to immolate him. His staff thrummed in his hand as it too resisted the colossal forces acting upon it.

Azerick sent his thoughts into his staff, urging the arcanum sphere at its top to seek out its own kind. The staff pulsed in response, guiding its wielder along a path between molten geysers and pools of liquid stone. Azerick walked through the twisting labyrinth of the underground world, often backtracking and finding an alternate route in order to bypass an obstacle he could not gate past. Rarely did the roof of the cavern dip low enough for him to see it. He continually inspected his protective sigils despite them being far more indelible than any simple paint.

His staff pulsed stronger, and Azerick soon spied a glow more silver than red. As he drew near, Azerick looked in wonder at the massive pool of liquid arcanum continually being fed by a geyser spewing the priceless metal more than fifty feet into the air. As he approached the arcanum lake, several globs began to form near the shore and rose out of its mirror-like surface. The globs took on a featureless but humanoid form. Some were only slightly larger than he was, but others towered ten feet over his head. One of the silver creatures, one nearer his human size and vaguely feminine in form, approached closer than the rest.

“You trespass and seek to steal what is not yours,” the creature said.

Azerick bowed slightly at the waist. “Forgive me. I was not aware this place and its materials belonged to another. My name is—.”

“We know what you are called, and we know what you desire.” The being pointed a finger at Azerick’s staff. “Like speaks to like.”

“You are made of arcanum?”

“We are arcanians. What you call arcanum is made of us. The bits you scavenge from the lifeless rock is the dust we leave behind when we ascend to our higher form and leave this shell of stone behind as we spread ourselves throughout the cosmos, seeding other worlds.”

“Then I would ask you a boon. I am in desperate need of arcanum.”

“We know what you need and why, and it is not our concern,” the arcanian answered bluntly.

“The scions will destroy us! If they return unchecked, they could find you just as I did and come here.”

“The Scions are gods and fully aware of our existence, but they concern us no more than your species. The arcanians are beyond such things.”

“They will destroy my race! Do you not care?”

“We know thousands of worlds and tens of thousands of races. What is the value of one, or even a few, to us?”

“I cannot leave without what I seek,” Azerick stated.

“Then you shall stay an eternity.”

“No!”

Azerick pulled at the Source, channeled it through his staff, and struck the arcanian with an intense ray capable of reducing the mightiest castle wall to little more than dust. If his attack had any effect on the creature, it did not show. The iridescent surface drank in the sorcerer’s power without even a shudder.

The arcanian laughed with the sound of a thousand wind chimes. “Your magic cannot harm us. If we have no fear of the gods, do you truly think you can concern us?”

Rage suffused Azerick’s soul, and he grabbed at his abyssal power and twisted it into the Source with every ounce of his being. The subterranean landscape vanished from his sight as a wave of colossal force blotted out his vision and swept over the arcanians. The ground shook, crevices split open to spew more magma into the air, and stones the size of cottages rained down, exploding and splashing as they struck solid ground or liquid stone and arcanum.

Azerick tried to peer through the dusty haze and destruction. A glimmer of movement caught his eye just before a stream of arcanum burst through the miasma, struck him in the chest, and crushed his body against a cavern wall. The arcanian drew closer, the silvery tendril absorbing into its body as it approached, and stared into Azerick’s face.

“Your species is young, and so I forgive your childish behavior this once. Leave our home and return to yours.”

“I can’t do that!”

Azerick grabbed at the Source and opened a gate directly behind him. The arcanian’s “arm” pressing against his chest shoved him through the portal. The sorcerer closed the gate and cleanly severed the argent appendage. The shimmering substance splashed to the ground but instantly began drawing together and reforming like spilled mercury.

Azerick ran down the magma-lit tunnel unsure as to the course of his next action. He hoped the pools of pure arcanum were not the arcanians themselves, only the place in which they dwelled. If that were the case, perhaps he could find an unattended pool and take what he needed before they found him. Those hopes died within minutes.

He found a smaller pool tucked between two basins of molten lava and felt a glimmer of hope. Before he could finish etching the first runes onto the cavern floor, the arcanum pool expanded upward like an inflating bladder. A silver tendril snaked out of the swelling mass and wrapped itself around his body several times, forming a vaguely human shape behind it.

The arcanian stepped from the pool and approached. “Foolish human, you trespass in your desire to steal then pathetically attempt to assault us in our very homes. Should such a species deserve to exist?”

Azerick struggled futilely against the appendage holding him in place. “I have no choice! I do not act out of greed or desire to harm or take what is not mine, but out of desperation to save mine and other races. Any people would do the same when no other options are available. Would you not do anything, violate any of your principles, to save your race?”

The arcanian tilted its head in thought. “You claim altruism. You claim to act on behalf of all who are threatened.”

“I do.”

“Then you will give us something in return.”

“Yes! Anything!”

“Give us your son Raijaun.”

Azerick felt as though the air had just been sucked from his lungs and the blood drawn out of his body. “My son?”

“What you desire is a part of us. In exchange for part of our essence, we require part of you. If you truly act on the behalf of all, the life of one surely is inconsequential in the grander scheme of things.”

Azerick instantly hated himself for even considering the creature’s demand, but what it said was true. How could he place even his own son above that of nearly every race of his world? Still, his love and parental desire to protect his family warred with duty.