The Fire and the Storm - Metric Pro Edition: Fiction, Dragons, Elves, Unicorns, Magic (39 page)

He cast an immense Revealing in the air above himself.  It showed a light-blue dragon on a dark, flat mountaintop, gazing up at the stars beside a huge, strange tangle of metals and precious stones.  The size of a Sylvan who attended him revealed that the dragon was very small for an adult, not much bigger than Karzog.

“This is Zarkog, before he became Lord of Serminak, before he increased his size and changed his color.” Karzog announced.  “The thing beside him is a device called the Psionic Distant Listener.  He used it to find intelligent beings on other worlds in the distant void.  What he’s about to discover in this Revealing, which is based on Readings taken from him much later, changed everything on our world.  These are the crucial facts that he kept from everyone else until some seven years ago, by your reckoning.

“He had discovered other worlds that bore life, and this prompted him to look for psionic emanations closer to Kellaran.  He found two sources of such emanations, one of which he never identified exactly.  What you’re watching is the night he identified the second psionic emanation that he found.”

In the Revealing, Zarkog suddenly cringed, then cringed again, drawing in upon himself until he was almost huddled on the flat stone of the mountaintop.

“He knew that there is a rock almost five times as big as Hiliani approaching Kellaran.” Karzog continued, “And that night he realized that it is full of millions, or billions, of demons.”

As they watched Zarkog suddenly jumped up and began raging about the mountaintop, roaring in anger as he tore clawfuls of rock from the mountain and blasting all about with his fire and destructive spells.  He crushed the Sylvan who attended him to a paste against the rock with a single strike, and generally destroyed his observatory and everything near it except the Psionic Distant Listener.

“This led Zarkog to decide that Kellaran needed to prepare to defend itself against the demons, and to decide that he was destined to lead our defense.  That’s why a reclusive astronomer became Dragon Lord of Serminak, and tried to take over the world.  And that’s why your god brought your people here all those years ago.

“After taking over Serminak, he attempted to extend his influence to the other continents, and that’s where he ran into problems…”

The Revealing showed Zarkog fighting and speaking to crowds of Sylvan and dragons as Dragon Lord; he was now almost impossibly huge, and was black with gold and silver accents.  Then, as Karzog verbally summarized them, he showed events from The War of The Founding of The Just Alliance, Zarkog’s downfall, the revealing of the Triax, the ending of the Withdrawal of The Gods, the organization of The Game of Status among the other Sylvan, and the establishment of the Hiliani colony.

“Your god made sure he was outside the time-bubble when it went up, and I’m sure that by now he knows all that I’ve revealed to you.” Karzog continued as the Revealing ended and faded away.  “But he’s not here, he’s trapped outside the time-bubble, and so he can’t prepare you to face the demons.  Therefore we will do so.

“We have only two objectives with you;  We’ll stop you from killing or disabling each other, since we may need every fighter we can get to defeat the demons.  And we’ll train you to fight the demons effectively, as a disciplined, co-operative force, equipped with many spells and techniques that you don’t have yet.  In order to fulfill these objectives, we’ll build a community for you, and you’ll gain the benefits, safety, and pleasures of life that your elders presently enjoy, but you do not.

“When we’ve accomplished our two objectives, we’ll leave the Sylvan of Hiliani in peace to run their own affairs, though you will be required to join our continuing battle training, so that our two peoples can co-operate and coordinate in the defense of our home islands.

“We four are not the most powerful or influential members of our community.  Some of you will consider it to be extremely bad luck that much of the elite of The Just Alliance have chosen these islands for our temporary withdrawal from the world.  But we four have chosen to fulfill this responsibility, and we’ve been authorized to do so by Prince Mark and Princess Talia, who are the rightful sovereign rulers of these islands.  We will not shirk or falter in our duty in the slightest, and we think we’re more than up to the job.

“Now some of you have very primitive thinking.  Because of this, you’re thinking to yourselves; ‘If we could get free of this spell right now, we’d obliterate you, because there are eight hundred and forty-one of us and only four of you.’  You think you’ve been tricked and trapped and that we’ve used cowardly methods, and you’re quite sure you’re going to kill us slowly at the first opportunity, which you think will happen quite soon.  You consider me to be the only real threat you face, and you think that if you kill me first, these other three will fall easily.

“We know that we’ll have to prove how wrong you are about these things in a way you’ll understand, before you’ll obey us.  And let there be no doubt; we do require your obedience during the first stages of your training.  Therefore you’ll be allowed to challenge us to combat.

“But before we get to that, I’ll answer your questions.  I’ll allow you to raise one arm to indicate that you have a question, and I’ll allow you to speak it so long as you remain civil.

“You, yes?” he asked as he used a quick flash of yellow light to indicate one of the many Sylvan who had raised an arm.

“How long will we be your captives?” she asked.

“That depends on how quickly you advance in your training, and what assurances you’ll be willing to give as to your trustworthiness after that.

“You, yes?”

“What
are
those things?!” a younger male Sylvan asked as he pointed at the three children on the grass.

“Those ‘things’, as you so disrespectfully put it, are Governor Longstrider, General Helemia, and Vice-Governor Valentia.  They’re warlocks.

“Yes, you.”

“Are warlocks a separate race of people, like extra-small elves, or just a different school of magic casters?”

“They’re a new thing in this world, that’s certain.” Karzog stated, then paused a moment to choose his wording.  “Warlocks draw power from a second source, one unavailable to all others.  The first warlock was Glup of the Zurb, who led a race of crustacean people beneath the sea some seven hundred million years ago, and he became the first god on Kellaran.  Since then six warlocks have appeared throughout the long history of this world, each born to a different race in a different era.  Though all were prominent figures, only Glup became a god.  None of their descendants inherited their abilities.

“There were no warlocks on Kellaran for the last eight million years, until Prince Mark’s power manifested some seven years ago.  My three friends are his children, and they’ve inherited his abilities, and perhaps exceeded them.  Only time will tell if their descendants will become a new race.  They’re small because they’re young and still growing, as are most of you, and so am I for that matter.

“Now, in order to prove to you that it’s futile for you to resist us, we’ll let you attack us with magical and projectile attacks.  Those who wish to do so may begin now.”

The Sylvan suddenly found they could stand up and move, but they couldn’t leave their places on the grass, not by flying, walking, or any other method.  They could use their magic though, and two-thirds of them blasted the four at the center of the vale with all their power, accompanied by a few arrows and stones.

The arrows and stones bounced off the quartet’s Shields, and the power of the spells was absorbed.  For almost half a minute the onslaught continued, creating a conflagration of light and noise.  When the four at the center had stored and absorbed all the power that they and their batteries could hold, they simply ended the Sylvan’s’ ability to move and use magic again.  Then they spent a moment Healing the injuries of a few Sylvan who were close to them and who had been hit by missed or ricocheting rocks and arrows.

“I think that proves the futility of you attacking us by magic.” Karzog stated.  “But I know some of you are thinking that we might not be so dangerous in physical combat, especially my three comrades here.  So if we could have twenty of you who are very dangerous fighters and who wish to fight General Helemia raise your hands, you’ll get your chance.  Don’t be shy; if you should injure or kill her during this challenge you won’t be punished for it.

“All right, the twenty I’ve indicated, come down to the center here.  I’ll allow the rest of you to move back a bit to make room.  Combat will begin as soon as you’ve moved back enough to clear a space twelve meters wide.”

Some of the Sylvan were sluggish about moving, and a few were obviously trying to break free from the psionic grip that held them so they could escape while everyone was moving.

“MOVE BACK!” Karzog roared in a tone of fierce command, then he speeded the slowest dozen by seizing them with Movement and tossing them up the slope a few meters.

“Why do we fight the smallest one?” a female asked Karzog, indicating Helemia.  “Just so we’ll be more embarrassed if we lose?  And who goes first?”

“You’ll fight me because I insisted on it, because I enjoy this kind of thing even more than my companions.” Helemia told her with a grin as she stood up and Translocated out of her armor.  “And I’ll fight all twenty of you at once, with no magic, and no psionic holds or attacks.  You’ll fight the same way.  If any of you tries to cheat by using magic or psionics against me, I’ll do the same to you, and I bet you won’t like that a bit!

“And just to keep things fair, I’m fighting you without my armor or my shield or my good weapons, since they have a lot of permanent magical enhancements.  Just this.” she giggled as she held up a knife with a fifteen centimeter blade.  “You can all use whatever you’ve got for weapons or armor.”

“You must be insane.” a male Sylvan said as he drew his sword.

“We’ll know in a moment, won’t we?” Helemia laughed.  “Whenever you’re ready.”

The Sylvan gave a snarl and chopped down at her with his sword.  Helemia merely side-stepped just enough that the sword brushed her clothing as it whistled by and struck the ground, and poked him with her knife over his heart hard enough to draw a drop of blood.

“That’s it for you.” she laughed as he winced and stepped back, clutching his chest to assess the damage.  “I’d have stabbed you through the heart if I wanted to.”

“Get her!” the Sylvan yelled as he attacked again, and the twenty converged.  They largely got in each other’s way, as only six of them at most could directly attack her at once without hitting each other.

She danced among them, her expression grim as her concentration focused, and she set to disarming them with strikes on their hands.  She had to deal out a few other blows and mild cuts as she did so to avoid injury, but most of her defense was dodging, deflecting, and blocking.  She moved through them at their knee level so quickly and unpredictably that none managed an effective strike against her.  When she’d disarmed them by disabling one of their hands, they picked up their weapon in their other hand and kept coming.  She had to disarm most of them at least twice before the combat came to an end, with all of them standing in a circle around her with their weapons on the ground and their bleeding and broken hands held awkwardly before them.  Though it had only lasted for four minutes, all of them were panting and sweating, including Helemia.

“And that’s that.” Helemia grimly declared as she settled into a stance in center of the circle.

“We’ll Heal you now; some of you have some bad leg wounds.” Karzog declared.

“I didn’t do those, they did those to each other.” Helemia pointed out as her companions performed the Healings.

“You cheated!” A female Sylvan declared.  “You were psionicly Reading us as we were fighting!  You knew what we were going to do before we did it!”

“I was, but it wasn’t cheating.” Helemia responded as she suddenly grinned.  “I only said I wouldn’t use psionics or magic as a weapon or to hold you, and I didn’t.  Still, if you want to go again without me doing that, we can do that.  But I’ll admit that I’ll need some more serious weapons for that.”

Her knife disappeared, and was replaced by two light, twin-edged, tapering short swords about sixty centimeters long each.  She waved them around for a moment in a very complex swirling pattern before settling into stance again.  “Any of you who want to pick up your weapons and give it another try are welcome to, and I promise not to Read you.”

All twenty of them did so, then gingerly advanced on her.  She was faced with a closing ring of steel points and edges, and the Sylvan slowly moved forward together, their weapons held as far forward as their reach allowed, to keep Helemia as far from them as possible.

When the circle of points was two and a half meters wide, Helemia suddenly darted forward and swept a sword aside with both of hers.  In a blink she was between two opponents (stabbing them both on the way by) and outside the circle of Sylvan, then attacking it.  She became the aggressor, and the Sylvan found no way to effectively defend against her incredibly quick swirling blades.  This was a far bloodier round; she disdained potentially lethal strikes, but that was her only limitation. 

Finally the last three Sylvan panicked and tried to run, only to find themselves held fast.

“And that’s it for that.” Karzog declared as the wounded were Healed again.  “I think we’ve made our point.”

“That was fun!” Helemia suddenly laughed as she donned her armor again.

“You.” Reggie suddenly said, and pointed out a Sylvan female of about seventeen years with his finger and a yellow light.  He’d been lounging on the grass watching Helemia’s fight, but now he stood and faced the girl he’d indicated.  “You didn’t attack us with magic when you could’ve, and you didn’t choose to participate in the fight.  Why not?”

She shrugged.  “I knew those idiots were kidding themselves.  There’s no way you’d invite us to attack you if you thought there was the slightest chance that you’d lose, unless you were being incredibly stupid, which you probably weren’t.”