Canto of Sand, Opus 1 (Those events of Eerithian history following the year 1415) The land ended abruptly as though some ancient god had snapped it in half, filling the crevasse with roiling sea, broken and uneven. There was nothing clean or crisp in the separation. Splinters of shale guttered the rough fall to the shoals at the cliff base. If one elder god had broken the land, surely another had been dragged beneath the waves, his claws tearing great gouges from the rock face. The faint light of a clear night's sky limned the edges and reflected from the black waters, making the crevasses all the darker. The hungry waves hissed and spat, ever striving to claim the stones denied them. To the lip of this elemental struggle, they came: three men of apparent station with a motley of drovers, a pair of donkeys trailing at the last. The drovers moved woodenly and in silence, their eyes unseeing, outwitted by their charges. The first of the three (for surely he was that--command emanated from his stride and he did not hesitate when he reached the cliff) began to give orders to the drovers. He was lithe but otherwise nondescript, weathered by the desert with brows that pinched into a fierce, black 'V' and squinting eyes that glared out with feral intensity. This night he wore the same dust-colored robes as the drovers; a leather bag, protruding outward in odd places, was slung over one shoulder. A freshly cut gash tore the flesh of his face and puckered it redly, running from his hairline to his chin, narrowly missing the outer edge of his right eye. The wound seeped with blood as the scabs broke at the movements of the man's mouth when he spoke. The other two men remained aloof, surveying the scene with a bored detachment. Both were clothed in finery unbecoming the apparent physical nature of the endeavor--silken blouses, scarves, brocade vests, doeskin breeches and tall, soft boots--the fashions of the late Avaerandian court. Both wore gossamer veils of darkest indigo over their faces. In the depths of the night only the slight difference in height and build served to distinguish the two: one was noticeably taller, the other, thicker. The drovers secured ropes and prepared to lower the men, anchored by the donkeys. The leader of the three surveyed the apparatus critically. "The merest exercise of power . . ." began one of the other men, but a gesture from their leader cut him off. "Not here. Not even this far away, certainly no closer," he muttered, more to himself than in actual reply. "Still, I am concerned that the shale may cut the ropes." "If it does, we shall simply plunge into the sea below and have done with," the taller man interjected. "You've three ropes--one of silk, one of hair, and one laced with threads of metal. There is naught else to be done for it." "I suppose you are right. Let us begin." "No, send the drovers first. Hold back only those who must guide the beasts. By this we may gauge the ropes," said the tall man behind his veil. Their leader nodded and gestured to one of the drovers. Without question, the man hooked a foot into a loop of rope and slid over the side. The other drovers walked the donkeys backward, lowering him over the edge until, by means of a series of sharp tugs, he indicated that he had reached the level they sought. Moments later, the ropes went slack then jerked again. The drovers obediently walked the donkeys forward to their original stance. Four more men went over the side and still the ropes passed inspection. "Shall I go first, to prepare your way?" the tall man asked. The leader looked at him oddly. "You're surprisingly compliant tonight." "Your injury is a source of amusement to me," was the frank reply; and the man looped a coil of rope about his wrist, disdaining the footloop. He squatted, easing himself over the side. The drovers stood in waiting until a word from the leader sent them into the now familiar pattern of activity. The leader descended next, followed by the final veiled man, who uttered a vile curse when he arrived roughly at the ledge below. "My comrade has scant taste for physical activity," observed the tall man. "There's not enough room on this ledge to work," complained the latest arrival and, in reply, the tall man pushed one of the drovers from the ledge. The man made no sound as he plummeted to the rocks below. "I hope we don't need his muscle later," said the leader distractedly as he knelt and examined the rock face before him. "Pass me the chalk." The tall man dug into the leader's shoulder pack then placed the stick of talus in the outstretched hand. The leader proceeded to make a series of marks, roughly square, barely wider than the length of a man's arm. "Chisel here," he instructed the drovers, then moved away to let them work. The sound of hammers and breaking rock seemed disturbingly loud in contrast to the silence of the workers. The cliff face broke away to reveal a narrow passageway, marginally larger than the hole the drovers had cut into the wall. The leader motioned and the drovers crawled into the dark tunnel. The three men waited, listening until, satisfied at the silence, their leader produced a heavy rug woven of reeds. "We can pull ourselves along, there should be handholds on the ceiling," he said by way of explanation, laying the rug on the bottom of the tunnel. Neither of the other men asked how he knew. The tall man went first, pulling himself along. After a moment, his voice spoke out of the darkness. "It opens up about ten feet in. I'll have one of the drovers crawl up and push the rug back to you." Minutes later, all three were inside crowded together in the darkness. "Make a light," growled the leader in frustration then immediately barked, "No! No power." "How then?" "With flint and steel, fool," came the hissed answer. "Have one of the drovers do it." There was an awkward scrapping and then a series of clicks. "This should could have been planned better," commented the tall man to no one. A rush torch flickered then brightened, throwing shadows intermittently about the area. The small band stood within a natural fissure through the stone, barely wider than a man but twice as tall, a pressure split in the shale. Loose gravel shifted underfoot and the striations of the sides slit the exposed skin of the drovers when they stumbled forward. The three men followed behind with a kind of serene resignation. Several hundred yards later, they entered a room clearly unnatural in origin. A smooth hemisphere had been cut from the stone. The arched ceiling was supported by wooden timbers, desiccated but unrotted. The area was empty, free even from dust and insects. As the drovers entered, the torch they carried guttered and waned to a ruby ember. "Not much air here," murmured the tall man. "This definitely could have been better planned." "Let it go," replied his shorter companion. "I'm going to light this . . ." "No," interrupted the leader. "Leave the torch in the rift. We've enough light for this night's work." "Will the beams hold the tackle?" asked the tall man speculatively. "These beams have held for a thousand years; they can hold tonight." As the leader spoke, the drovers were binding a set of pulleys to the crossbars in the center of the room. The drovers were clumsy in the darkness but they worked steadily. The apparatus was strung with rope, suspending an iron hook above the floor. "I thought there would be an eye preset," said the shorter man. "There should have been," replied the leader. "The old texts were wrong." He lowered his bag to the ground and drew out a brass spike. The spike widened out from the tip until, at its midsection, it abruptly narrowed again, to an end capped with four spreading leaves. The man laid the spike aside and struggled to pull a hand drill from the bag. Kneeling beneath the hook, he worked the hand crank, drilling into the floor with exaggerated caution. Once the hole was deep enough, he set the brass spike within it and gestured to one of the drovers. The drover approached and held a spike centered at the intersection of the four brass leaves. The head of spike was twisted back upon itself to form a hook. Another drover came forward, cradling a heavy brass sledge. "Brass," the tall man commented to himself, "that's well planned. No sparks." "Your approval means the world to me," said their leader sarcastically as the drover drove one spike into the other, spreading it and anchoring both into place. The drover hooked the spike and the tackle together. "If the texts were wrong about the eye . . ." The tall man left the sentence unfinished. "Every undertaking has its risks," replied the leader, then motioned at the ropes. The drovers pulled the ropes taut then set their feet and began to pull. With agonizing slowness, a section of the floor began to shift. A clay cylinder almost four feet wide began to grind upward from its hiding place. The drovers continued to haul at the rope until the entire cylinder swung from the pulleys, freed from its pit. The cylinder was taller than a man and encircled in angular cuneiforms. "Hold it," instructed the leader and the drovers set their feet. Moving swiftly, the man pulled a folded cloth from his bag. He unfurled the light fabric. "Hold this around the top," he ordered the two men beside him and they complied. Digging into his bag again, the man withdrew several charcoal rods and painstakingly took rubbings of the entire surface of the cylinder. When he had finished, he folded the cloth with exaggerated care not to smug the impressions. A sharp pop recoiled through the chamber and the cylinder shifted suddenly. As the spike broke free of the cylinder, the tall man spun away and grabbed one of the drovers holding the rope. Before the menial could react, he thrust the drover between the cylinder and the lip of the pit, wedging it in place with the man's body. The cylinder rocked backward with a muffled rasp and stopped. At a motion from the leader, the remaining two drovers wrestled the cylinder away from the pit to rest on the solid ground alongside. The leader gestured toward a drover and ordered, "Break it." "Wait!" interrupted the tall man and the drover stopped, waiting with the sledge held loosely in his hands. The tall man circled the cylinder slowly, his gaze lingering over each cuneiform before moving on to the next. Completing his circuit, he nodded then said quietly, "Break it." "Painful, watching the freedom of your people being destroyed?" asked the leader as the drover moved to the cylinder. The tall man stood looking straight forward and replied in an even tone. "If it did, Tarfn, I would never give you the satisfaction of knowing." With a crack like ice dropped into boiling water, the drover's swing broke the cylinder. The shards of clay cascaded down in an avalanche of terra cotta and the room was silent again. The leader moved to stand in the room's single exit and the two other men moved to stand before him, facing in. Insects crawled from the rubble of the hollow cylinder, long imprisoned within and hungry. Black roaches with scorpion tails swarmed out onto the hapless drovers, stinging and biting. Those which approached the entrance turned away from the two men standing there, somehow immune to the creatures' predations, and returned to feasting on the drovers. The vermin stripped their victims to the bone then fell still, dead and bloated. The leader pushed between his two protectors and almost ran to the remains of the cylinder. He knelt and lifted a block of hardened clay the size of a very large tome. "We are done here," he pronounced, in a satisfied tone. "We have the Mirror." ** The wind had taken its knife to Rahi's skin and marked her as its own. As it had worked, the sun had bleached her pale and stained her dark. The swirling smoke of her ceremonial tattoos had faded even as her skin darkened until they seemed sunken into her body, criss-crossed by newly won scars and wind-blistered wrinkles--a scrimshaw on her bones glimpsed dimly through a screen of weathered flesh. No longer sheltered by the black robes of a seeress, Rahi's body reflected her mind, renewed and battered at the same time, forged in the heat of the long journey on the anvil of the sands to new strength and scarred by ill-tended wounds of the past. The changes could be seen just as clearly in the steady growth of the child-mimic Hope, Rahi's constant shadow. That others in their caravan had changed was equally true albeit less displayed. To most of those assembled, the barren desert was father and mother, but now it turned against them, a once doting parent become distant, chastening its brood and forcing them to define themselves in opposition--a psychic puberty of topographic proportions. The orphans of Myr Kun, finding succor among those thought an enemy, had become in turns passive, then resistant, then resourceful, slowly releasing their desire for isolation and the definition it gave them to become part of the whole. They were no longer victims, but survivors, burying their past as they had been unable to do for their dead. The Sinari chaffed at the weakness about them and, when alone, snarled and tore at each other, bent by inner conflict, some nursing a festering resentment while others questioned the past in light shown by the present. The theologies of old no longer met with the truths witnessed firsthand. Tensions grew until, near journey's end, most turned back to the dunes and left to rejoin their people, setting their minds back to the comforts of ideologies long upheld. Those who remained turned away and embraced their new role. Outwardly, they did not change, keeping the rituals and costumes of their only lifestyle, yet inwardly knowing that ties had been forever severed; and wondering if they, like the wind-daemon Rahi, should cast the old pretense aside to burn or blaze in the desert sun. Scattered among the tribes of man walked and sometimes flew the enigmatic spirits, the flaming fragments of a shattered god, the children of Albous, the corrupt and the pure. The twin keys of Sinari acceptance and guidance unlocked the taps of powers long unused. There, upon the barren dunes, these broken shards of power became at last individual. Finding others in reliance and need, they performed miracles as the land had not seen in generations, and at times, water flowed from the baked stones and the desert flowered at their passing. At the end, the caravan which emerged, scathed and purged, chastened by the fire and frost of the sojourn, was of one mind and only one people--not of Myr Kun, not of Sinari, not of the spirit-sons of Albous, but one folk of many types--in the end, they emerged as Eerith.all but one. One had, of necessity, remained separate. Where others drew water, he called forth ice; where they, comfort; he, hope. Even as the rest fought to live beyond the day, he kept their focus of the future--a future, not of more todays, but of tomorrows--of things better and beyond. While they fought to grow into themselves, he gave everything he was until his very emptiness defined him. A living symbol of a dream of a hope they could barely comprehend, he went before them as a cloud in the day and a towering flame in the night. It was he who bargained with a startled sovereign when they reached the water-rich kingdoms of the south to insure a place for his people, even as they were content to rest and heal at a river's edge, marveling at the wonder of the greenery about them. They called him Valor, this creature, this valerian, this reborn first speaker of the corrupted and the pure--Val-or, in the old tongue, the all of the all. They had seen him lead them across an impossible wasteland where none had died and they had seen him walk among the wounded, easing their pain and healing their wounds; but only one had possessed the strength to go after him in those brief moments he spent alone at the twilight of the day. Rahi, tired beyond thought yet dogged in determination, had watched and slunk silently behind as Valor had passed among the injured and drawn apart from the camp. That she might be somehow violating his wish for privacy was a concept lost upon her. Thus it was that she watched from hiding. Watched as, believing himself alone, he laid aside the robes of travel to reveal a body covered in cuts and sores, wracked with torn muscles and broken bones, each of the wounds he had "healed" actually drawn into his own body. She watched as the wounds bled until he had no more blood to give, until he collapsed from the wracking anguish and the golden fire of his spirit bled out onto the sands when blood was not enough. She watched as the fire grew and raged until it consumed him wholly and burned itself out, leaving him once again whole in body and drained. And then, after she had watched him die and burn to phoenix-ash, lying hollow and defeated, she went down to him and cradled his head in her lap until he rose again, wordlessly returning to those who followed him. It was then, finally, that she knew she had been right to leave her people and follow, for it was then that she was certain that this Valor was no mere Eerith; for a certainty, Rahi knew, she traveled at the right hand of a god. *** The crack of wood rang against the arched ceiling followed by the clatter of a dropped stave on the stone floor below. The gymnasium was almost deserted, an unusual occurrence since its resurrection less than a year ago. Training classes were suspended only twice each day: the mid-day and evening meal. Even in the dead of night, drills continued with different classes of students, for Eerith did not need to sleep and news from the north was increasingly desperate in tone. The Mirrish vanguard, at the very least, would have to be ready to march in less than eighteen months, sparse time to forge an army from the soft remnants of the old empire. While the rest of her burgeoning army ate, Riacrada practiced, alone with her Eerith mentor. This was the ending of her day, a continuation of his. When they had finished, she would raid the mess kitchens, spend a few frantic hours delegating matters of statecraft, and, with luck, sleep a few hours before rising to lead morning drills. Through the night, other commanders, under the Eerith's watchful eye, would hone their own troops, some of which would eventually graduate to the more elite forces which the Warlord trained directly. "You're dipping with your wrists. You have to compensate for that when you get tired," Reese noted coolly as Riacrada retrieved her practice stave. "I know." "It all revolves around stamina. You have to have it and you have to learn to recognize and correct when you don't." "I know." "Everyone is tired on the battlefield. You'll be lucky if you can start rested but even then, nerves and the initial rush will sap your strength. Better to learn how to fight exhausted. You droop the blade over like that on the field and it will be your arm you're reaching for, not a stick of wood." "I said I know. Ready?" "Of course. Don't let your constitution kill you. Whoever is in the best shape wins on the field. Even if you are above average, remember, the enemy will come in waves and when a single slip can get you killed..." "Reese!" she snapped. "I said I know! I'm not stupid! Every time I slip, every time I make a mistake, you give the same speech! I understand what's at stake here! Do you hear me complaining? Am I arguing with you? Must we go through this every time? I am not a child!" "My apologies, Warlord. This is my nature," he replied calmly. "Damn your nature, Reese! Don't you Eerith ever change? I even understand that I'm too valuable to ever risk in combat and, because of that, I have to be the best at it." She sighed and squared her feet to her shoulders, bringing her stave before her in a two-handed grip. "Advise me as we fight. I need to practice speaking and proper breathing." "Of course. First, Warlord, I sense that you are frustrated and, as a pupil, in need of some small compliment or reassurance." He attacked cross-body, putting his weight behind the attack, forcing Riacrada to give ground as each block sent sharp shocks through her wrists and forearms. "Let me state, then, that I believe you have the potential to be one of my greatest students." "That's your idea of a compliment?" she replied through clenched teeth, shifting her weight forward to let her upper arms and shoulders absorb more of the shock from the blows. "That I might be good?" Reese altered his attack, driving his stave into hers near the hilt, forcing her to block with strength against strength. "I said great." His hilt slammed into hers as Riacrada chose not to fall further back and they stood, hilt-locked, straining against each other for several seconds. "As it is, I think you will be forced to put to field too early and all my work will be for nothing." Reese sprang backward and she stumbled forward, off balance as the staves separated. The Eerith pivoted around her clumsy lunge and rapped her smartly on her flank. "I can't save you from that." "And even that," he added quickly as she turned, "Is assuming that your nepotic Emperor does not countermand you to your death." "Now I know you've lost it." She attacked low, using his height against him. "The Archmage has sense enough to leave war to his generals. And certainly more sense than to give orders against my recommendations." Reese retreated rather than lowering his guard against her low strikes. "Let us hope. I've seen better men do worse. The Sinari are behind schedule; that's a start." "Any idea why?" "None. They've spent almost three months in Myr-Kun instead of sweeping into the Wyr basin. Now they'll have to wait out the monsoons. Our eighteen months is quickly becoming a full two years. That's the good news." Rather than retreat all the way to the wall, Reese blocked her next lunge. Riacrada extended further and his block drove her stave into his ankle. "Now who's tired?" she teased. "I have to mimic the occasional human weakness." "What's the bad news?" "More Sinari. The delay has let them swell their ranks. We may have to move our entire army rather than just a vangaurd." "Not unexpected. How..." The rest of her words were lost in a rush of sound and wind as one of the gymnasium's many entrances burst inward before a dark and gathering storm. A wave of blowing dust preceded a roiling whirlwind of fire sweeping into the room. Reese turned from Riacrada, dropping his stave as he did so. He strode quickly to meet the blaze, his form becoming an indistinct haze which was swept into the burning tornado and woven into it. The firestorm grew brighter until Riacrada was forced to look away, eyes watering, ears ringing from the howl of the winds. As quickly as it had come, the disruption was gone. The soft scrap of Reese lifting his practice stave from the floor seemed to fill the air in the sudden, extreme silence. "This may be our last session for a while," Reese said, adopting a defensive stance and nodding at Riacrada. She took the cue and began a pattern of strikes. For several minutes, the crack of wood was the only sound in the gymnasium. The Eerith's defense was minimal, pragmatic, his attention obviously elsewhere. "If you die on the field, the future you are worrying about no longer matters," chided Riacrada. "Forgive me, Warlord. You deserve my complete attention." She stopped her assault and backed away several steps. "Break. Report." "That was Kernin . . . unexpected news in the north." "Sinari?" He nodded. "And Mir. Nioratosa has led an attack on Tarfn." Riacrada took a deep breath and stared at the floor. "Perhaps I am tired and not hearing well. Surely, you did not just tell me that the son of the Archmage has engaged in a military endeavor without the consent of the proper authorities. Surely, Mir has not committed an act of war against the Sinari without even informing its Warlord." "Nioratosa has led an attack on Tarfn. Such an action could not have been done without approval of the Archmage. Logistics preclude it. An absence of staff has been noted in the past few days but no more than would be required for a diplomatic envoy." A small part of her mind noted that her knuckles had gone white clenching the stave's hilt and she felt strangely disjoined from reality. "Advise." An odd tremor in the Eerith's voice told her that he, too, was not as calm as they were pretending. "I'm guessing, but I believe the line of reasoning goes as follows: In the eyes of the Council, Tarfn is a traitor to Mir and not a Sinari. That makes an assassination attempt an act of justice, not of war." "A semantic point the Sinari will never respect." "Of course. Following that reason, the military and the Eerith would be considered a security risk. Ruling out the military, only Nioratosa's personal envoy would be available for the task." "And making the Archmage's son a popular hero certainly wasn't part of the consideration," Riacrada noted sarcastically. "Possibly. If so, that portion of the scenario has proven counter-productive. The casualty level was.extreme." "Not surprising. Untrained magi filled with their own pride attacking a military position. Were there any survivors?" "A few, Nioratosa among them. Asadu is dead." "Asadu?" "The human Kernin was grooming as the Archivist's replacement, the one who named the Eerith god-parents to his child." Riacrada cursed softly. "This is bad all the way around. What about Tarfn?" "Official status unknown." "And unofficially, my Eerith?" "Unofficially, he was expecting the attack and got off with a mere scratch. He currently has a level of protection well beyond what a handful of magi can burn through. I doubt that a trained coterie could have succeeded." "I know better than to ask how you know that," Riacrada replied. "I'll have to go to Cedonia and Talthera and try to get them to mobilize in order to buy us more time to prepare." "Milkanuri." "All the rest of the Wyr basin," she concluded and cursed again. "That's a lot of damage control. How am I supposed to find time to train troops, let alone a true coterie?" "Convince your Emperor that Mir is at war and leave it in the hands of those who are trained for it." "Very funny, Reese. You're getting awfully close to treason." "Make the contacts in the north and west, delegate the details to your commanders, and come back here to train your coterie. You'll lose maybe six months. I don't like taking to the field with only one coterie but it can't be helped." Riacrada nodded to herself. "Better than nothing. Any chance of Eerith assistance on the field?" "For which side? The Sinari will be pounding on the door within a month with a formal declaration of war. You should delay your departure until then, at least." "Maybe that's for the best. I still don't see how a coterie can ever be as powerful as you claim, even with training." She rolled her head from side to side, listening to her neck crack. "I'm tired, Reese. Let's call it a night." In response, he lunged, a straight thrust at her midsection. It was easily blocked, but Riacrada knew from experience the goal of the thrust was not to connect. She caught the stave with her own but the impact knocked her backward, off balance, and sent splinters of pain through her limbs. She went to a knee to regain her equilibrium and Reese's stave slashed just above her head as she dropped. Furious, she cut under his attack but he had already backed away, ready to lunge again as she stood. She blocked but the effort sent pain roaring through her muscles. "Stop it!" she roared. "I have to go see the Archmage!" "He can wait," Reese commented lightly then shot his arm forward and threw the wooded stick at her. She deflected it with her own, surprised. The Eerith stared at her, gauging her every move, and extended his left hand. A heavy broadsword fell free of the weapons wrack at the wall and slid across the floor to his feet with a serpentine hiss. "You wouldn't dare!" In reply, he knelt and hefted the blade, weighing it first in his left hand then the right. He looked away from her momentarily, as if distracted, then sprang. Riacrada saw the attack coming; the feigned distraction broadcast his intentions clearly after so long as sparring partners. She danced backward, away from the cut. The heavier blade would splinter her stave if she tried to block. "I don't know what you're doing, but I've had enough of it!" she growled, retreating from another heavy-handed slash. She could not mimic the Eerith's trick of levitation, not fast enough to replace her stave, but she was not without her own magics. The Eerith was slashing broadly with little thought for defense. When next he swung, she followed it, moving forward in the blade's wake, before he could reverse the thrust. She tried to smash the wooden hilt of her practice blade into his face but he twisted aside, over-weighted by his swinging blade. She followed her own inertia past him, sprinting several steps across the gymnasium. As the Eerith recovered and closed again, she turned her focus to the wooden stave in her hands. Forcing a calm she did not feel, she turned her will on the plank, forcing an image from her mind and into the wood, watching as its fibers hardened into a blackened shaft, somewhere between metal and wood, like a fire hardened spear point--crude, but solid enough for the task. The Eerith was almost upon her, swinging the broadsword in another wide arc. Even as she stepped to block it, he altered the swing, pulling short and thrusting, as much with his legs as with the blade. Riacrada threw herself backward and the blade tore through the padded leather of her practice coat. She resisted the urge to exchange blows and backed away, bringing her black shard in line with her arm, turning sideways to present a smaller target. She could not match his strength or the weight of his blade but neither could he match her maneuverability with the lighter weapon. He squared his feet and stood full on toward her, the blade held two-handed, hilt low and to his left, horizontal before his thighs. His eyes flicked up and down her, watching for the slightest shift of weight. Without question, she was tiring rapidly and time was his ally. The sparkling remnants of her earlier magic were still buzzing within her mind and she caught them now, the power and the will, forcing it into her arms and shoulders, and summoning more. Every instinct and instruction cried warning against it, no mage turned their power inward, the risks.were better than dying. Crystal lances of will reinforced her muscles and her heart hammered within her chest at the strain. Her vision was changing; all her senses were--wider. . . and more precise. She was acutely away of every detail: the smell of her own sweat and the Eerith's lack, her pulse, the rasp of her breath; and even as her senses widened, so too did they narrow until the universe was a slim razor of blackened wood. She struck, hard and fast, the power in her legs and back throwing her lunge forward faster than any bolt of lightening. As fast as she was, the Eerith was faster. He swept his blade upward, still parallel to the floor, forcing her blade upward, over him. He disengaged his sword, driving it downward, tilting slightly under the power of his forearms, to strike her knees.almost. Even as he blocked her lunge, she committed her balance, willing herself forward onto her outstretched, and exposed, leg. With strength more magical than real, she pushed off again, an abortive leap, just clearing the riposte. It was more of a fall than a landing. Riacrada drew her right arm across her chest, thrusting the blade safely beyond her left side, and tucked her face into her shoulder. The landing was hard, her shoulder bone cracking on the stone floor, her face, not completely turned, taking a portion of the bruising impact, but the twist was enough. She rolled painfully over the turned shoulder and across her back, coming to one knee. Her senses screamed, too much for her even to understand, just act. She pushed off hard with her legs, shoulder-rolling again, this time in control and smoothly, coming to her feet at the end. Behind her, the room rang with the retort of steel, striking sparks from the stone where she had knelt a split-second before. She spun, partially crouching, her body aflame with energy, with fury. The Eerith took a half-step to steady himself from the miss and she sprang. The air itself screamed as the obsidian shard cut though it as she lanced forward, all her focus again a single strike of ebony. The blade passed just over the Eerith's left forearm and struck him full in the chest, ripping through to stop only when the hilt-guard struck the leather of his padded jacket. Ria released the trapped blade and staggered backward, head spinning, the sound of her own blood a rushing torrent in her ears. "Better," commented the Eerith, looking bemusedly down at the hilt of the blade that poked comically through the other side of his body. "So that's how it works," Ria muttered, suddenly finding herself sitting on the stone floor. "It's a start. With a properly trained coterie behind you, you should have around eight times that much power." Reese pulled the blade back through his chest and tossed it aside. "Are you blind when you blink your eyes?" "No, not exactly, what." "When a coterie works together, that's how the power is. You toss it from one person to another in those blinks of time when you don't need it so that each of you has all the power of the others. Usually, one member of the team remains out of the fighting to concentrate on that. It's also a common practice to leave a few members in a safe place off the field so that their power is available constantly." Ria listened without understanding. Her hands were trembling and her vision was spotted. A sudden flush and chill shook her body. She stumbled upright desperately and vomited noisily on the Eerith's boots. "There are also some costs for that kind of power, but I understand that it gets easier with practice." The Eerith walked to the benches at the wall and returned with a bucket of water and a towel. "The Archmage can wait for another day. His actions were not unforeseen." The Eerith looked at her distress with amusement, then cocked his head to one side and added, "Get some rest and clean yourself up. She's coming, don't you know." M. Keaton ---------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send mail to celandra-off@phoenyx.net.
