Authors: Rain Oxford
“What are you talking about? What do you know?” he
asked.
I rolled over to face the wall. “Don’t know what
you’re talking about.”
He grabbed my shoulder, pushed me onto my back, and
pressed a gem flat against my chest, the sharp edge digging into my skin. “Tell
me!” he demanded.
Heat burst from the gem to flood my body, but just as
quickly, the darkness stirred beneath my skin. It was freezing and burning,
painful and numbing, all at the same time. It absorbed Sen’s mage magic without
a hiccup. Of course, the balance was the most powerful force in the universe,
equal only to the void. Someday, I would overcome the darkness inside me, but
until then, I was at its mercy. It seemed to vibrate under my skin, as if
laughing at my thoughts. It didn’t matter; someday the darkness would be a mere
tool at my disposal.
Sen backed away from me, probably feeling the great
power inside me. I stood, trying to hide my own discomfort, and went for the
weapons on the wall. “I will fight these battles myself. You two can practice
with me, but this is my fight. If I am to overcome the universe itself, I
should learn to rely on myself.”
“Isn’t that was Hail is for? Even your father has
friends. Nobody can do everything by themselves,” Drake said.
“I can.” I reached for the smallest sword, but when I
lifted the handle from the hook, the blade fell off. “Okay. Not that one,
then.”
Drake took down a longer sword and examined it. “This
one works.”
I took it carefully and knew immediately that it
would never work. “It’s too long.” There was bow, which I knew Hail would have
chosen, but it wasn’t my thing. Actually, weapons weren’t my thing. The only
weapons remaining that looked functional were a fancy dagger with a
jewel-encrusted handle and an axe that had seen better days.
Sen took the dagger as I handed the sword back to
Drake. “Hey, these are real!” he said as the emerald jewels glowed green.
“What about the dagger we got from Dayo?” Drake
asked.
I shook my head. “If we lose it, we’re worse off than
we started.” I took the axe and studied the blade. It was chipped, scuffed, and
rusty. Hell, it was hideous, and the ordinary black handle was a letdown to say
the least. “They’re going to laugh if I go out there with this.” Seimei nudged
her head against my stomach encouragingly.
“Can you really hurt someone with that? Can you kill
a person?” Drake asked.
“I have before.” Well, not me, and not a person. The
balance used me to kill an Ancient.
“You won’t have to use it if you let me do it. I can
tell the opponent to surrender and he will.”
“Does it work if they don’t understand English?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then it should be me,” Sen said. “My power works on
everyone as long as I have the right stone.”
“I’m going to do it,” I said. They both glanced at
each other with obvious lack of confidence in me. “Seimei can help me.”
“You said if you have Seimei, they can use a beast,
too. You have no idea what they may have,” Sin said.
“Griffins are some of the strongest magical beasts,
and Seimei is much more powerful than any of them. She can help me.”
Three plates appeared on top of the chest along with
three glasses of water. On the plates were bread, cheese, and small chunks of
roast. Drake and Sen took their plates and sat on the beds. “Do you think it’s
safe?” Drake asked.
Without answering Sen ate a piece of his bread, meat,
and cheese. When he didn’t pass out, they both started eating. I wasn’t hungry
enough to want to eat it, but I knew time would just make it worse.
* * *
A large bell sounded throughout the small room. “I
guess that means it’s time,” I said. We were all sitting on the beds in
silence, waiting for the moment when I would have to fight. I hated fighting. I
wanted to heal, not kill.
The room around us disintegrated, leaving us in a
dark arena. It was a circular stadium in which the field was surrounded by a
huge wall with bleachers beyond it. Lights in the high ceiling made it
difficult to see into the crowd, but I could hear them. They didn’t sound like
supporters.
“Nobody said this was going to be in front of an
audience,” Sen said. “This isn’t about testing you, it’s about entertainment.”
A large screen lowered from the ceiling and huge,
illuminated symbols appeared. When it changed, Drake looked at me. “It’s a
countdown. You two have to get off the field before we run out of time or we
lose by default.” They both stared at me. “What?”
“Your hair and eyes are turning back to their normal
color,” Sen said.
“What?! I can’t fight looking like a mortal!”
“It happened when you lost your power on Enep… we
were just afraid to tell you.”
“No way! Those Arcani people knew I wasn’t one of
them on sight because my hair is so different.”
“You
naturally
look different than them. I
don’t think you have seen your own natural appearance in a long time,” Sen
said. “No one says anything because you get a little irrational when it comes
to your hair and clothes.”
“What’s wrong with my clothes?” I asked, desperately
trying to find a flaw. I held up my hand and called on my power. Illuminated
energy formed in my palm… and then faded. My energy was fading again. “Not
now!”
“Actually, this is perfect timing,” Sen said. I
didn’t have a chance to fight; he pressed a jewel against my chest and the
world grew dark.
I wasn’t completely unconscious, as I could feel
myself being carried. When I could finally force my eyes open, I was still
immobile and propped up against Seimei. Drake and I were in the bleachers while
Sen was on the field with his unimpressive dagger.
“Sorry we had to do that,” Drake said, realizing I
was coming out of it. “You are so used to Hail backing you up that you think
you can handle anything.”
I couldn’t speak, so I had to watch as the young
dragon-mage faced death. In this case, the opponent was formed of black smoke.
I thought at first that it was a demon, but this was actually a person who
could turn into black vapor. He was huge; easily as big as Ghidorah, with two
long swords and metal full-body armor.
A bell sounded and the enemy waited.
Sen held out the dagger like a weapon, obviously with
no clue what to do. His opponent held his hands over the ground in front of
him. All around Sen, dirt exploded upward and assembled into two dozen
creatures slightly taller than Sen that immediately converged on him. He threw
them back with magic and fire, but they were relentless.
His power was still working on me so much of the
battle was a blur. At one point, Sen was on the ground at the earthen
creatures’ mercy. Somewhere in my head, I knew I needed to pay attention and help
him, but my body wanted to sleep.
Drake shouted something beside me that caused me to
jump and my eyes to snap open. Sen had shifted into a dragon. He was slightly
larger than his mother in dragon form, much smaller than Mordon, with a unique,
gold/red color to his scales. His wings were powerful even compared to a forest
dragon.
Sen blew fire over the dirt creatures. It didn’t slow
them down. Sen took a dive at the conjurer, but the enemy disbursed into smoke.
Undeterred, the dragon blew fire over the smoke, which actually burned up. As
the conjurer was defeated, his earthen creatures buckled. Sen landed, not
gracefully but in a tumbling mess, and smeared blood on the ground. He was
injured.
When Sen slowed to a stop, the crowd held its breath.
Drake leaned over the wall that kept the crowd away from the field. “Get up,
Sen!” he yelled. “Get up!”
The lethargy was slowly fading from my body, but not
fast enough to do anything to help him. Mordon was going to hate me for getting
Sen killed. “Get up,” I muttered as loudly as I could. A stranger next to me
stared for a moment before standing up next to Drake and yelling it as loud as
he could.
Others around us began shouting it too, and it
spread. I doubted any of them knew English or even what they were saying for
sure, but they were supportive. They were cheering Sen on.
But he didn’t move.
Guards entered the field in full armor and the crowd
fell silent, disheartened. Then, just before they reached him, his dragon form
shrunk slowly, his bones reshaped, and his scales became skin. He breathed
heavily and tried pushing himself up.
He flopped back down on the ground and panted, but
the crowd cheered hard as the guards gathered him up.
Everything faded. When light returned to the world,
we were all back in the room, exactly where he had been, except Sen was lain
out on the bed, bleeding from a deep cut on his chest. Drake gathered medical
supplies from the chest and got to work disinfecting, cleaning, and bandaging
the wound. Since my magic wasn’t working, we were fortunate Drake’s father was
an emergency medicine doctor and had taught his son basic first aid care.
“He can’t do the next one,” Drake said somberly. “I
will do it.”
“If my magic comes back in time, then not a chance.”
* * *
Unfortunately, my magic hadn’t returned the next day
when the bell rang. Sen was healing, but not awake. When the scene morphed into
the arena, Drake, Seimei, and I were standing in the field. The countdown
began.
“I’m not letting you fight,” Drake said, “and if you
don’t get off the field, it’s a forfeit.”
“If you die, I will take control of every demon and
sic them on you to make your afterlife Hell.”
“Have a little faith in me.”
I couldn’t agree. Instead, I turned and walked off to
the small opening out of the field. To the right and left were steps up into
the bleachers, while straight ahead was a dark hallway guarded by six men with
swords. I went up the stairs on the left and found an open seat. Seimei
followed me and sat beside me to watch our friend.
The enemy appeared this time right in front of Drake.
He looked like the same man who had faced Sen, but since he wore a helmet,
there was no telling. Just as the opponent raised his sword, Drake held out his
hand as if to ward the enemy off. He said something that was too far for me to
hear, and the warrior stopped cold, then dropped his sword.
Seimei growled and did her odd shiver of warning,
which made her fur and feathers fluff up. She hated messing up her feathers as
much as I hated messing up my hair, so I knew her warning was serious.
I stood and leaned over the wall, desperately willing
my powers to return in time to prevent whatever it was Seimei sensed. Drake
pointed his sword at the warrior hesitantly, only to freeze up. He couldn’t
kill a man in cold blood.
The warrior moved in a flash to pull a metal object
from around his neck, put it to his mouth, and blow on it. Many people in the
crowd screamed, for although the sound wasn’t low pitched, high pitched, or
loud, it was painful. Drake dropped to his knees and covered his ears.
I jumped over the wall before I knew what I was doing
and hit the ground with a roll that propelled me right up onto my feet. I was
running as the warrior retrieved his sword, but there was no way I could make
it in time.
Fortunately, Seimei was faster. She flew over me, her
great wings outstretched, and crushed the warrior beneath her. Her claws dug
through his armor like cotton. The bell sounded, symbols spilled across the
overhead, and the crowd screamed in outrage. I didn’t know if they were on our
side or not, but they were not throwing things at us.
“I’m sorry,” Drake said, trying and failing to hold
back tears and I took his arm and pulled him to his feet.
Seimei, covered in her victim’s blood, made an odd,
loud chortling sound, reared up on her hind legs, and stretched her wings out
wide. The crowd cheered enthusiastically.
“What is she doing?” Drake asked.
“I think she’s telling them we’ll win the next one.
We only have to win two of the three battles.” The sound of our fans was cut
off as we appeared in the room again.
“I want to go again,” Drake said, sitting beside Sen.
Sen was still unconscious and I still had no power,
so I couldn’t really make an argument against it. We had to win. Winning was
everything.
“I will go this time,” Azyle said, appearing between
us. His voice was calm and friendly, never loud or excited, but it seemed to
carry and fill every inch of space in the room. Although his English was
perfect, his accent was rich and distinctive to Mulo.
The Guardian of Mulo was a quiet man who worked in
the shadows to do his job without worrying about receiving credit. He would not
push his advice onto others like Shiloh, nor keep his head down and mouth shut
like Samorde. He was not eccentric like Emrys, responsible like Edward, a spy
like Nano, or an enforcer like Ghidorah. In fact, the only reason I even
noticed him at all when we crossed paths was because he was beautiful.
I could make my eyes blue and my hair black like my
mother’s, and my skin was flawless, but I couldn’t pull it off like him. His
skin was lighter than most men’s, more like mine, but he somehow managed to
avoid looking in any way pasty. His hair was blue-black with perfect waviness
and was just long enough to curl in his neckline with slightly longer bangs
that went down to his cheekbones. He had what I couldn’t even call a stubble,
for it was short enough to tell that he put effort into his appearance.
Physically, he was about six foot tall and not hugely
muscular, though he wasn’t overly thin, either. He was always fashionably
dressed when I saw him. His long-sleeved, button up silk shirt hinted at a
muscular build, while his black pants must have been tailor-made for him. Black
leather boots completed the ensemble.
“Hello, Azyle,” I said softly and gave him my best
smile. After all, he was a Guardian; I should be nice to them. I didn’t want
the Guardians to worry about me turning on them like the gods did.