The Archimage Wars: Wizard of Abal (48 page)

I turned in time to see Medrod coming
toward me swiftly with a big sick grin spread over his face as he
came at me with Caliburn held ready.

I moved back, which let me see my
mother and Morgain fighting. My mother was a terror, and knocked
Morgain down again, and then started binding her with some kind of
magic. I also saw The Dragon finish the last of the necromages
which were attacking him, and head our direction.

“
The Dragon is coming!” I
yelled, but that was all the aid I could give my mother, I was
nearly falling down from the pain and Medrod was coming.

“
Heal your body, Nick!”
Hydan bellowed from somewhere behind me, obviously too busy to get
to me.

I thought about his suggestion and
managed to actually believe my shoulder was all right. I think the
anger which was still hammering in my skull made me capable of
believing just about anything I needed to in order to kill Medrod.
I had a one-track mind at the moment, so doubts had little chance
to sneak in.

I got my shoulder fixed just before
Medrod arrived.

I believed a large boulder from the
ceiling was loose, and it fell toward Medrod, only to turn to dust
as it came into the range of Caliburn.

Medrod smiled grimly, and said, “Time
to die, wizard.”

I managed to leap back when he tried a
cross-body swing which swept the sharp tip of Caliburn past my
throat, missing by just two inches.

“
Remember what I told you!”
my mother yelled from where she was battling Morgain.

What had she told me? I thought back
through my mind clouding anger and recalled she had suggested I use
Caliburn against Medrod, even if he was wielding it. How in the Sam
Hill was I supposed to do that? Everything I made would render to
dust when it got close to Caliburn!

Everything I made.

That’s when I saw the dagger sheathed
at Medrod’s waist.

I immediately feinted left, and he
swung his sword that way, but I changed direction and came in
behind it, tackling Medrod. I saw him concentrate for a moment, and
then a look of surprise came over his face. He lost his footing and
we both went down hard onto the stone floor.

“
I will kill you!” Medrod
bellowed, attempting to bring the large sword around for a thrust,
but we were nearly chest to chest, and the sword was too unwieldy
at this range to be an easy weapon to employ. But I had no such
restriction, as I’d tackled Medrod I’d yanked his dagger from his
waist.

I snarled in fury, and with adrenaline
fueled strength I thrust his blade home, coming up under his ribs,
and into his beating heart. This was no necromage; Medrod was a
living, breathing person.

This was Medrod’s own knife, so it was
kept real by Caliburn since it was part of his reality. The knife
transfixed Medrod’s heart and his eyes bulged in surprise just as
he started to say something. Then he gasped in a breath, and the
life went out of his eyes. Medrod’s body tensed and then relaxed
and Caliburn fell from his limp fingers.

Medrod was dead… again.

“
About damned time,” I
muttered, snarling into his dead face. I was still seething in
anger, so I twisted the knife, making damn sure he was good and
dead, and then some.

I scooped up Caliburn and then turned
to find The Dragon still approaching. As he passed my mother the
circle of blackness around him on the floor had flowed around her,
but she held an island of normal stones below her feet, fighting
back the First’s power for a moment. Those black hands were
reaching up out of the floor, but could not reach her body, not
yet.

That’s when Myrka arrived behind The
Dragon. She leaped over the black circle, and seemed to glide in
the air further than was possible; no doubt she had done something
to make her body defy gravity. But as she came closer to The
Dragon, that reality failed, and she suddenly plummeted
down.

She let loose another blast of Derkaz,
but The Dragon’s protections once again deflected the energy
away.

Myrka landed on the black floor, as
the dark hands grabbed her legs and took her down.

I saw my mother do a very brave thing,
she ran toward Myrka, and the clear area of floor followed her.
When she reached Myrka, the hands retracted into the floor, but
Myrka wasn’t moving.

The Dragon looked back and smiled as
he spoke to my mother, “You are strong, Albus, but not strong
enough to take on a First, not indefinitely!”

I realized he was right, and I wasn’t
going to tip the scales either; there was only one thing which
could help my mother now.

I turned and ran from the battle. In
my mind I could hear what Myrka would have said, ‘coward’, but I
knew what I was doing. If The Dragon followed me, his circle of
blackness would as well, and that would free my mother and
Myrka.

But I wasn’t just running; I had a
destination in mind. I felt for the sensation we had been following
earlier and felt it ahead, and to my left. It took me to a wall,
but I had the fury focusing my mind, and I realized there was no
wall there, and there wasn’t. My passage opened into a secret room,
and there, in the middle, was a dark smoky green crystal, with an
indistinct shape within. It was the same material the now Deadrod
had used to try and bind The Dragon.

I remembered Toji telling me how equal
energy had to be used to undo some magic, and how Hydan had warned
me of doing things the wrong way and releasing all the energy in an
explosion, but I didn’t care, I was just too damned angry to worry
about it.

Behind me, I sensed The Dragon
coming.

I just imagined that crystal
exploding, with everything I had in my anger focused mind. That’s
when it did just that, exploding into ten thousand little shards,
many of which would have hit me had my subconscious reality not
been protecting me from that kind of fast moving harm.

When the debris was gone, a saeran
stood there in a blue robe. He lowered the hood and opened his
eyes.

“
Are you the Archimage of
Abal!” I cried out.

He looked at me and replied, “Yes, I
am the First Wizard of Abal.”

“
I have freed you from your
Crystal Tomb, now DO SOMETHING! The Dragon and Morgain are out
there killing my companions, and taking your World!”

Suddenly a massive amount of water
welled up right out of the stone floor, and then it formed into a
tidal wave. It picked both of us up on the crest and washed us out
of the hidden room and into the larger audience chamber where the
battle was taking place.

The Dragon was approaching, but at the
sight of the approaching wave of water, and the First Wizard of
Abal, The Dragon’s dark eyes looked up, and he gestured to the
ceiling. Blackness flowed up in a column and hit the ceiling, which
crumbled, falling from high above. The entire ceiling of the room
started to fall, the damage emanating outwards in a circle from
above The Dragon.

Morgain took one look at the crumbling
marble and then turned and ran out a side door, and I saw my mother
dash off after the fleeing Dokkalfar necromancer.

The stones were now about to come
crashing down on all of us, or they would have, except my father
gestured and a wide geyser of water shot up from the floor, and
then spread out in a dome around us, forcing the stones to the
sides away from all of us. When the stones stopped falling the
Archimage of Abal cut off the water, but The Dragon had
escaped.

I went to Myrka and knelt down. There
was a weak pulse in her neck, and I started believing in her full
health, picturing her as she was, standing ready to deal death at
any moment.

Myrka’s eyes opened, and she sucked in
a breath. Then she looked up at me in wonder.

“
You healed me!”

I shrugged, “I knew you were healthy.
It was something Ziny taught me,” I replied, tears coming to my
dark saeran eyes, tears for the little girl I had slain.

Ziny’s little headless body was only a
few yards away, but there was nothing I could do for her now. I
could not take the body of another mage, just to bring her back.
She wouldn’t want that. Even if I wanted to bring her back from the
dead, and there was a part of me that did, I really had no idea how
Morgain had accomplished that trick with Medrod.

The Archimage of Abal came over and
said, “Your enemies have fled; I felt them use Morgain’s Portal.
Now that I am free, I don’t believe they wanted to stick around,
not when the rightful ruler of this World is there to oppose
them.”

I looked at the saeran who was my
father, and I have to say, he was damned impressive. There was a
power coming from him which was hard to describe, it came from
confidence born over long life, and a well of power deep within.
This was an Archimage, and his power held this World together. If
Hydan could be believed, he had created the saeran race and made
the rules this reality adhered to; all done long ago.

“
Who was the woman in the
white armor who pursued Morgain?” the Archimage asked.

“
The White Enchantress, no,
don’t ask, she wants to explain it to you in person,” I
said.

He nodded, and then asked, “And who do
I have to thank for my rescue?”

I grimaced but kept my promise to my
mother, “A loyal Saeran wizard. I was here to rescue that little
sorceress,” I said, gesturing toward Ziny’s little body, “but she
had already been killed by Medrod, and turned by
Morgain.”

“
I see, I’m sorry,” my
father said softly.

I nodded and then said, “There is
more, in the battle I had to slay your son, Medrod. Morgain had
resurrected him from death, somehow, and he was attempting to stop
us, and well, end us before we could reach you.”

The Archimage sighed, lowering his
head. “It was with a heavy heart that I slew my son in the first
place, but I did so for the good of Abal. How can I blame you for
doing the same, again? My son was seduced by a dark power, to the
point of insanity. I thought it was all because of the Dokkalfar
necromancer, Morgain, but now I see she was only part of the plot
against Abal.”

I explained, “It looks like The Dragon
was behind the powers they were using to defeat you.”

He nodded, and said, “It would appear
that way.”

“
Now what… Archimage?” I
said, stumbling over using a title instead of my father’s name,
which I realized I’d never actually heard. Finnabair had always
called him, ‘your father’ or ‘the Archimage of Abal’.

At my stumbling over his name he
asked, “You don’t know me?”

I shrugged, “I know you are the
Archimage of Abal, but I grew up on Earth, and I have little
knowledge of things here on Abal beyond what I have learned in the
few weeks since my arrival.”

“
A Hidden Soul?” he
asked.

I just shrugged, for all I knew I was
a Hidden Soul; I had no memory of my past. Then I said, “My friends
call me, Nick.” As I said it I realized these three mages watching
this exchange were more than my companions, they were my friends,
even Myrka.

The Archimage held out his hand and
said, “Well, then since you are my rescuer, Nick, I guess it
behooves me to introduce myself properly, I am the First Wizard of
Abal, and my name is Merlin.”

Chapter
Eighteen

The magician and the other
so-called Gods of our legends'

Though Gods they
were

And as the elders of our
time choose to remain blind

Let us rejoice and let us
sing

And dance and ring in the
new,

Hail Atlantis!

-Donovan

My father… is Merlin? That thought
kept going through my head, but I couldn’t wrap my brain around
it.

It turned out Morgain had called all
her remaining necromages to the battle, and so there were none left
here on Mystical Island. We went to the place where Morgain had
created her own portal to the other Worlds. Merlin did some sensing
and told us this is where our opponents had escaped, all leaving
Abal.

Merlin started to walk out, headed to
search other parts of the fortress, but I noticed Toji lingering
behind. I stopped and said, “What is it, Toji?”

Merlin and the others paused at the
exit.

Toji came toward me, looking
apologetic, and when he drew near he said, “Please forgive me for
what I must do, Master Justnick, and understand I have no
choice.”

I was puzzled, “Forgive you, for
what?”

He suddenly snatched the hilt of
Caliburn from where I was wearing it belted at my waist, and then
stepped back with the naked blade in his hand.

“
Toji!” I said, frowning
and taking a step back. I was shocked, why would Toji, my friend,
want to kill me?

“
That is Excalibur!” Merlin
said, “I would know that sword anywhere!”

But Toji didn’t attack me, or anyone
else, he just smiled, rather sadly, and then stepped into the
Portal and disappeared, taking Caliburn, or as Merlin called it,
Excalibur, with him to another World.