Chapter 2: The Searcher

A figure cloaked in black hurried between the tents scattered on the grasslands ten miles south of Areth, the form slightly hunched and moving in a furtive manner that could only be described as fearful. His hood completely covered his pale face, unusual among the primarily Ramai’i settlement, and beneath his cloak a hand carried a lump wrapped in the dry brown leaves of the only vegetation of the area in an indefinable shape.

Slipping into a nondescript tent some distance from his beginnings, he pulled the package from under his cloak and began to hurriedly rip off the coverings, hoping to quickly discharge his mission and escape from the awesome and fearful presence before him.

The figure was easily six feet of high, a giant among ants, and his crimson cloak covered a body strong yet lean, with flawless gold skin and a black mane that shimmered red in the candlelight. As it turned around, the face was revealed to have a sharp and hairless chin beneath two intelligent black eyes, a long nose and a mouth of white teeth twisted into a sneer. His left ear bore a small hoop of gold and his right cheek an image of a skull, not completely covering the deep scar left from a duel early in life. Overall, the twenty-eight-year-old figure gave off an aura of power and superiority, worthy of the obedience he did command.

His voice cruel and cold, he thrust out his right hand, adorned by a ruby ring reminiscent of the signet ring of Elysia, and sneered, “Have you found a way to earn your keep, worm? Or will my Zaka by eating today?” He chuckled coldly as the smaller mans eyes flickered nervously towards the cage at the far end of the room where a cat-sized spider waited, its legs scuttling back and forth on the metal floor.

“Y…y…yes, my Lord Shaleth?”

“Oh?” Shaleth arched one black eyebrow as he stared at the man before him dubiously. “Am I to believe that you, worthless exile from the Magicians Guild, was able to find a book that centuries of research by scholars could not?”

“N…no, my lord, but…” The smaller man hunched even further as he squirmed under his superior’s heartless gaze, gulping slightly. “But I found this in the chambers of the Sarik.” Giving the now unwrapped item to his superior, he waited nervously.

“A mirror?” came the response, the voice dripping with venom.

“The inscriptions say that it can show the location of the elementals, sir.”

Curious, Shaleth ran his fingers along the silver backing, examining the ancient spells and feeling the power, before turning it over to gaze in the reflective surface of the mirror. “Show me the air elemental.” As the surface swirled and an image began to form, a deep chuckle emanated from the tall mans cruel smile. “You may prove useful to me after all, worm.”

In the middle of conversing with his sister, Rick suddenly felt a strange gust of wind and shivered, though not from the cold. He looked anxiously to either side, sure that something was watching him… but there was no sign of anything, and his keen hearing heard not a sound. Shrugging, he started to ignore the strange feeling and continue on with his daily routine of theft and begging; then stopped. Not a few times in his short career had his life been saved by a hunch much like this one, and he was not one to ignore them. Worried, he motioned to his sister to be quiet, and quickly led her to an area of vine common to the city, placing her behind it at the entrance to a tunnel. Many years ago, he had used that tunnel to escape an angry merchant and made his way outside the city walls, and hopefully it would help them escape whatever it was he sensed.

“Lily, if anything happens to me, you have to run down this corridor and escape, okay? Don’t wait for me - you have to run. Do you understand?”

After the tiny girl nodded solemnly, tears in her eyes and her arm clutching the rag doll that was their only memento of their old home, her brother stationed himself on the roof of a nearby building where he could watch all who approached, secure in the knowledge of his sister’s safety. Sitting himself down on the tiles he began to munch at the rest of his bread while he waited. It was going to be a long day.

The tall man’s eyes gazed ever deeper into the mirror, controlling its movements with his mind in order to use it to its greatest capacity, pinpointing the location of his prey. The mirror was known to take days to recharge unassisted, and he could not risk letting any of the elementals escape his grasp. Of course, by sunset the element of air would be his, and recharging the mirror would be the least of his abilities.

Smiling at the sight of an area well familiar to him, he put the mirror face down in a draw which he padlocked heavily as the other mans voice hesitantly commented, “Do you have any more requests of me, my Lord?”

“Yes, worm, I do,” the man replied, facing the one he named worm as his eyes glowed with bloodlust. “Send the R’han to the west wall of Areth to search out a young thief who lives in a shack in the alleys. I want him alive.”

Bowing to his master, the servant scuttled out of the tent and made his way towards the barracks housing the elite Ramai’i assassination squad known as the R’han, feeling a twinge of empathy for the boy thief cursed with elemental powers. Though the boy would be returned alive, he would not arrive undamaged, and the servant doubted he would survive long at the hands of the vicious Shaleth.

Five minutes later, twelve men garbed entirely in black began to gallop northwards.

Rick shivered as a dry southern wind blew across the buildings of the city, ruffling his scanty clothing and causing him to gaze about in worry. He had always thought of the wind as, if not a friend, something he could trust, having on many occasions come to his aid through bringing clouds or blowing dust in the face of his pursuers. Foolish superstition, perhaps, but he had learnt to pay attention to the wind. This wind brought with it the heat of the desert and the smell of sweat mixed with sand, and the hard thudding of hooves on the empty plains just south of his city.

As he tried to focus on the sound and what the wind, he saw an image of a group of men on black horses at the river gate of the city, before his consciousness returned to his frightened form on the rooftop. What have I just done? he thought, and How can I escape? Ignoring for a moment the first question, however curious he was, he started to climb down the trellis. He had scarcely five minutes, and he knew now that this was not an enemy he could fight off. Maybe, he told himself, I can draw them away from Lils long enough for her to escape. Clinging tightly to this hope, he started to pick his way down the street, keeping in the shadows and slowly moving away from his sister.

As the black horses stepped through the river gate and into the busy city of Areth, the lead figure held up one hand to indicate a halt. Closing off his mind from the noise and the midday heat, he focused all his senses on the spark of untrained magic he had just felt. His magical ability finely honed in order to trace and capture enemy sorcerers, it was for no small reason that he was known as a searcher, the elite and feared R’han. Placing the source of the magic, he leapt into his saddle and followed it like a dog followed a scent.

“Remember,” he hissed in an almost snakelike manner to his followers, “The boy is to be retrieved unharmed. Use sleeping toxins.”

Rick moved quickly and stealthily, quickly making his way to the busy main street of the city. Though none there would help the thief, most who saw him lashing out in distaste at his beggarly appearance or hatred of his profession, it would at least be harder to track and kill someone in the midst of a crowd of people. Producing an almost clean cloak seemingly out of thin air, though truly from his stash of costumes near his common entrance, he quickly submersed himself in the crowd, trailing along behind a woman and her two children about his own age.

Watching their happy laughter and childlike games as their mother looked on with love and occasionally disciplined, he couldn’t help but feel a little envious. These children had grown up with clean clothes, regular food, a fire, a bed, love, friendship, toys… he had had none of those. But there was no time for envy when he was on the run and discreetly stealing an apple from a nearby cart, he moved away from the happy family and towards the edges of the crowd, where he could look behind him. He hoped against hope that he had lost them and was safe, but he knew that the only thing separating him and them was time.

“He’s around here, I know it,” hissed the lead figure as the 12 men looked upon the busy marketplace from the shelter of a shady alley. He could sense the person’s presence in the crowd as surely as he could sense his own existence, and never before had his prey escaped him. He would not let it happen now, though the life force of all the members of the crowd mixed with occasional bursts of magic from street side magicians clouded his thoughts and made him temporarily lose the trail.

Only temporarily, though.

This child is cunning, it thought as it waited, near invisible in the alley, maybe he thinks he can outwit me. But I am patient, and there will be no escape. To capture one such as this would be a great honour. Smiling coldly at the thought of the honour he would receive and the possibility of drinking his prey’s blood, he stared intently at the street until he saw a brown-cloaked figure anxiously moving towards the crowd, a nervousness unusual for one in the mob. As the people around him thinned, the man could sense the magical energy coming off this one, and his eyes glowed red.

“That is the one, in the brown cloak,” he said to his men, moving his horse out of the alley and towards the boy, still facing in the opposite direction. “He is ours.”

Ricks eyes darted anxiously around the street though his head stayed firmly straight, not wishing to reveal his anxiety where any weakness was a danger. Seeing nothing, he had begun to relax when he felt himself being watched, and he immediately knew it was malicious. Calmly and collectedly, like he had remembered something left at home and decided to retrieve it, he turned himself around and insinuated himself with the flow of traffic in the opposite direction, moving towards the threat as he tried to ascertain what it was.

Then, he saw it, black hooves breaking the ancient cobblestones, ebony hairs slowly emerging from the shadows, jet armour glistening in the noon light. He heard each footfall as if in slow motion, gazing at the hooded face of the figure as it turned to stare at him, grey eyes locking with red as his entire sphere of existence narrowed down to a single moment of space and time.

A powerful force seemed to flow from his eyes to the red orbs opposite, wild and uncontrollable, and suddenly the link fell apart and he could move again. Without a second thought he ducked to the ground and rolled into the shadows, the poisoned dart of the second black figure missing his scalp only because of his quick reaction time and sixth sense. The next dart would be fatal, he knew, so he just couldn’t let it find him.

His eyes firmly on the armoured man, he backed quickly and silently through the shadows to another alley, where he turned and bolted. Around corners, through buildings and over rooftops he moved, his path unplanned and unpredictable, taking routes no full-grown man could know of, let alone walk through. But somehow he knew that the man was just one step behind him, and if he stopped, he would die.

The searcher had been confident when the boy locked eyes with his own, wondering only how foolish the child must be to lock eyes with one of the R’han. All Ramai’i knew it was impossible to escape that gaze, that they would be completely under his power until they were dispatched… so why did he do it?

More importantly, how did he break away?

The searcher had felt a powerful force coming from that boy, and it angered him that any would be so foolish as to defy the Lord of the R’han. It was no longer a job, but personal – the boy had to be captured in order for the searcher to regain the respect of his followers. But no matter how closely they followed him and how clearly he saw the trail, the boy always seemed to be one step in front of him, almost as though he was controlling the trail. It was insufferable, and the searcher was beginning to get angry. The boy must die, he decided, though Shaleth his master had ordered the opposite. He can find another boy – this one is mine.

With the added impetus of his hunger to drink the magical energies from the boy and add them to his own, his strengthened power allowed him to catch up to the boy, appearing ten metres before the boy on a horse steaming and frothing at the mouth. The boy was trapped.

“There is no escape, boy,” he hissed soothingly, his voice calming and relaxing. “Just come to me, and you will be at peace.”

Peace. Oh, how he wanted peace! Escape from theft, escape from starvation and dirt and constant worry, escape from the strain of the world and the stress of bringing up his sister and the constant worry and fear. Just eternal peace…

Unthinkingly, he took a step towards the man. His voice was so soothing, so relaxing, so compelling…

Compelling…

Suddenly he felt something pulling on him, something powerful and indefinable, dragging him away from the peace. He struggled for a moment, but then he moved his eyes from the strange person’s for the second time, defying him as he stood.

“No.”

Glaring, the black man drew a sword from his belt, wide bladed and curved, coloured a black as deep as the night sky. Advancing towards the boy, the man hissed in a voice repulsive to the young boy, filled with the sound of sand and snakes and venom and darkness, “Then you will die.”

For a moment Rick stared calmly at the man as he advanced, then nimbly climbed up the wall to his right and yelled, “You’ll have to catch me first!” before running back across the roofs of the city under the hot Elysian sun.

How dare this boy defy him? The searcher growled and mentally sent the R’han to various places along the city to wait for the boy. One of them would catch him, and then the insolent child would die.

For a few minutes he ran across the roofs, until when he looked behind he could see no sign of the armoured man. Maybe I’ve lost him, he thought, and began to move slower as he hid his trail as well as any tracker. Scrambling down a drainpipe near the east side of the city, so far from where he had begun, he sat near the docks and listened to the sound of the sea as he pondered the strange man who had been chasing him for what seemed like hours.

What does he want of me? the boy wondered as he idly threw a pebble into the deep blue of the eastern sea. The man was surely no city guard or knight, he didn’t even seem to come from Elysia. And his voice… it sounded like the man was part-snake… but of course, that was a foolish idea brought on by too many lonely nights. But what could the young thief have done to offend a man so skilled, how did they find him, and how did he escape? They were all questions that he would consider when he got back to his sister and home. With no answers, only more questions, he stood up and began to walk down the alleys towards his home.

Then, in the shadows up ahead, he saw a familiar black armoured figure. Cursing, the boy backed up and moved along the shadows near the wharf, hoping that the man hadn’t seen him.

He sidled up to the next alley, looking around closely for any pursuers, and started to follow the shadows in. But there! At the end of the alley, there was another black figure, lurking in the darkness with sword out. How many ARE there? he wondered as he continued moving through the darkness, spying yet more black armoured figures, slowly moving closer to the port… and him.

As he reached the north end of the port, where the open space ended and the enclosed alleys of the city began, he saw the last three alleys blocked off by the last of the men, a man he somehow sensed was the one who had followed him the whole time. Looking around him, he searched for any other way to get out, any possible escape from these men who seemed to be able to look through walls and know his movements before he did. But all around him the men were closing in, forming a rough ring around the shadow in which they seemed to know he hid, twelve black armoured figures with twelve black swords and twenty-four evil-looking red eyes.

He was trapped.

The lead man, the armour of whom he now noticed to be decorated with blood red markings vaguely resembling serpents of flames, stepped forwards and extended a single hand gauntleted in obsidian. “Come with us,” the man hissed, “and we will teach you power beyond your wildest dreams. You will be the greatest of us all.” Power? Rick thought to himself, what power? They must think I have magic, which is why they’re following me, but it’s all a big mistake! Why can’t they leave me alone?

Rick said nothing, remaining perfectly still in the shadows as he crouched catlike and prepares to run. The man stepped forward and spoke again. “Come to me, child, for you were born to be one of us.” But Rick knew him to be lying and remained silent, glaring obstinately at the black stranger who had taken such interest in him. Spitting at the foot of the figure, he said, “You may kill me, but I will never join with you!” and leapt at the nearest figure, catching him by surprise as he leapfrogged off his shoulders and into the darkness of the alley behind.

Bolting up the alley, with no more thought for concealment and twelve figures intent on his death directly behind him, he heard nothing but the roar of blood in his ears and saw nothing but the street whizzing past as he ran harder and faster than he ever had before, ducking under poles and around people as nimbly as a shadow before the frightened people were pushed to the ground by the black creatures, now remounted upon their steeds and catching up with him by the second. In a moment they would have him…

Unable to run any faster, and knowing that his doom was near, Rick gave in to the roaring in his mind and the presence hidden behind, his vision going red in anger. How DARE they chase him like that, when he had never done anything to them? Stopping in the middle of the street, his eyes rolled back into his head and he turned to face his pursuers, arms stretched out before him as the world seemed to move in slow motion and all his thoughts and anger centered on the man in the black armour.

Suddenly a wind began to blow from behind him, fierce and uncontrolled, breaking apart the wooden stalls and throwing silk ribbons and tiles alike into the air to shatter on the cobblestones. Harder the wind blew, tearing at the faces of the people who cowered against the walls and clung in terror to the stone, afraid of this strange new wind and the boy who wielded it. Harder it blew, whipping the boy’s hair around his face like a lion’s mane as he stood calmly and unmoved. Harder… and eleven figures were lifted off their feet and thrown back down the alley to where they fell in the cold, dirty water of the eastern sea. Stronger… and one man in armour adorned in ruby and obsidian was brought crashing to the ground, the impact smashing his helmet and head alike.

Suddenly, the wind stopped, and the boy looked around at the chaos he had caused, and the eleven men down the alley getting to their feet as they recovered from the impact. What have I done? he thought, seeing the fear in the eyes of all those who watched him, and feeling that same terror of this unnatural new power.

Turning, he ran down the street, tears pouring down his face as the sight of the man’s skull cracking on the ground like an egg replayed over and over again in his mind, wanting nothing more than to escape from the site and the memory that it had happened. Unable to see properly in his fear and shame, he didn’t notice the city guards until he crashed into one of them, throwing both to the ground. Afraid that he would be killed, he began to back away when the one he had knocked grabbed him by the arm.

“Now, what do we have here?”

Cara had awoken that morning intending to have an uneventful day, engaging in the training exercises that took up most of her time and maybe spending the afternoon reading a book sent over by her father. But when she felt that sense of wrongness, she knew that there was something going on. She had had hunches before, a presentiment that something would happen, and it generally turned out correct; so she gathered Danae and a group of loyal soldiers together and moved out to patrol the streets.

For most of the morning the city streets seemed to be relatively peaceful, no significant thefts, no murders, no riots, and she was beginning to mistrust her intuition when she felt a small surge of power, like a gentle breeze running through her mind. Curious, she began to scour the marketplace for stories, and soon became the recipient of rumours from all areas of the town about black armoured figures that moved like the lightning and killed anything in their paths. They seemed to be half-snake, the people said, with hissing voices and forked tongues, and Cara began to worry. She had heard stories of the R’han, the legendary Ramai’i warriors garbed entirely in black… but they were just stories, right?

Then, maybe half an hour after the first surge, maybe longer, she felt a rush of power through her head like a fierce gale or a burning fire, and not far in front of her saw tiles flying and shacks shattering like the city was caught in a windstorm. Starting to move towards the source of the commotion, she hadn’t noticed the young boy until he crashed into her, but something about him seemed familiar, like she should know him.

“Now, what do we have here?” she muttered, crouching on the ground to stare into the reluctant eyes of the boy after looking over his dirty and ragged clothing. He tried to move out of her hand, casting nervous glances behind him as if afraid that he was being followed, but her grip was too strong for him and eventually she felt his shoulder slump in resignation as his almost silver eyes looked resentfully into her emerald orbs. A flash of power seemed to flow between them, the air around them almost glowing, and the two people looked at each other in astonishment.

Each of them had always been different to the rest of the world, the owners of a sixth sense that left them feared by most who got close to them. But as they looked at each other, somehow each recognised a kindred spirit, and the boy tentatively returned Cara’s warm smile. “You’re like me,” she heard him mutter, and Cara knew as surely as she knew anything that they were destined to meet.

“What’s your name, boy?”

It was such a shock to feel that link, that similarity with someone, that Rick almost didn’t hear the question, and when he did he wasn’t sure how to reply. No one had ever asked him his name before, no one had ever shown any interest at all in this scruffy child apart from disgust and now fear. He had never seen that look of concern and friendship that he saw in the strange soldier’s eyes… but somehow, knew he wanted to keep it. Quietly, afraid that once she knew his name she would lock him in the dungeons, he said, “I’m Rick.”

“I’m Cara,” she replied, glad that she had managed to get the boy to talk. “Do you have a mother, Rick?”

“No, she left us when I was four. I don’t remember her much.” He looked anxiously at the woman, afraid she would look at him in disgust and hatred like everyone else, no one liked a street child. But instead she looked slightly sad, and though he didn’t know it, inside her mind she was pitying the boy and wishing that her civilisation was organised differently. No child should be forced to live on the street.

“What were you running from, boy?” She suspected that it was an angry grocer, but his answer surprised her completely.

“There were these men,” he began, looking around anxiously, “I don’t know what they were, but they were dressed in black armour and they hissed like snakes. I thought there was only one of them, but there were twelve and they were trying to kill me and they kept following me when I thought that I had lost them and one of them mentioned something about magic and then I made a wind and it blew them away and one of them died and the others are coming and I don’t know what I did but they’re so scary and I don’t want to die!” Out of breath, the boy started to sob as he said, “I don’t want them to hurt Lily, but I didn’t want to kill them,” and Cara gently held him like she used to hold her young nieces. “Don’t worry, child, it’ll be alright,” she murmured as she rocked the crying seven year old, finally able to act his own age, and looked around at the streets for any sign of his pursuers. “They’ve lost you, I won’t let them hurt you.”

Behind her, she heard some of the soldiers mumbling, and one man said, “That’s all very well and good, Cara, but you’re a soldier of the queen and you have no time to pick up errant children.” Other soldiers echoed him, while Danae looked on helplessly.

Sighing, Cara made a decision that would change her course in life. “Danae,” she started, quietly, “You know how sometimes I have a sense, a knowledge that there’s something I have to do?”

“Yes, Cara,” the brunette replied, knowing inside what her friend was going to say and sad that it had to come to this.

“Well, I know that this boy and I are linked somehow, and I have to stay with him and protect him. Maybe I can live up to the legacy of my great grandmother and do something important, I don’t know. All I know is that this is my path. Can you tell the Officer that I’m leaving the guard to follow my destiny?”

“Yes, Cara.” With tears in her eyes, the brunette hugged the girl who had been her friend for so many years. “I’m going to miss you.”

“I’ll miss you, too, Danae. Maybe I’ll come back one day.” Smiling sadly, she took one last look at the soldiers who had been her family for the past three years, before picking up the young boy easily in her arms and walking away from them. Feeling Rick calm down, she quietly asked, “So where is this sister of yours?”

“Her name’s Lily,” he replied bravely, somehow trusting this woman, “And she’s four years old. I left her in a secret tunnel that leads under the walls, so she’d be safe. I have to look after her, you know?”

Such responsibility for one so young, Cara thought to herself sadly, recalling her own carefree childhood, and said, “Well, if whoever sent those black armoured men is still following you, we’re going to have to take her somewhere safe. I think my father will look after her, then we can seek out the magicians in the north and discover what exactly this power of yours is.”

“We?” the boy asked, curiously.

“Well, you can’t exactly think I’m going to let you go alone, can you? Besides, if what I think is correct, those men will still be after you, and me too. We… whatever we are… need to stick together.”

“But who were those men, and how did they find us?”

“I think that they’re the R’han, the searchers. Legends say that they are half demon, bred by the ancient Ramai’i to seek out and destroy magic users. Once they have a link on you, they will chase you forever… though, hopefully, the only one linked to you is the one you killed. They were used against the Elysian magicians in the days of the wars, but they haven’t been seen for over five hundred years. Legends say that they were locked away by the Ramai’i where no one would ever find them.”

“But if they were locked away, how did they come back?”

Cara smiled warmly at the boy, though inside her heart was seized with fear. “It’s only a legend, child, the most likely case is that they are and were just sorcerers in special clothes, and you’ve already shown that you can beat them if they come again. They might even leave you alone now, after the loss of their leader.”

Her soothing words calmed Rick, making him feel foolish for his fear and his unquestioning belief in the legends. But as they walked towards the city gates, Cara’s pace picked up despite herself. Despite what she had told Rick, she knew very well that the R’han were real once, and the number of witnesses indicated that his pursuers were anything but human. And if the void was open and the R’han released, she feared that soon they would be encountering legends much worse than a half-demon searcher…