Dragonmage

One

"Good day to be alive, sir. Good day to be alive, he said."

Metallica, 'No Leaf Clover'

                They sat together in the darkness. Two figures, a young man and an older one, enshrouded on all sides by black. It was not that there was no light to let them see their surroudings - rather that there was no surroundings at all. No land, no air, not a shred of reality was there to taint the inky blackness. Every dimension they could perceive brought to them the same pure nothingness, except for the other's presence. It also brought sound, when one of them chose to speak.

                "What do you wish to learn today, young lord?" The question came from the older figure, who had opted to stand rather than sit in nothing.

                The other present lifted a hand, the skin on it taut and smooth, to rub against his chin as he had seen his teacher do when he appeared to think. "I want to know about humans, Garton. Tell me about humans?"

                Garton looked around from the facet of emptiness that had attracted his attention and eyed his charge, "Humans? What do you want to know about them for, Paelyn?" His gnarled, pitted face was set calmly, the vision of knowledge and wisdom in living form.

                "Because, they confuse me so." Paelyn looked down at the black beneath his feet, "Everything they do has no meaning, no motive. They are chaotic, aggressive, petty and self-centred. Why is that?"

                "I do not know."

                The youth looked up at his teacher in concern. He did not know the answer to one of his questions? That was certainly a first. "Why not?"

                "Because of the very reasons you listed, young lord." Garton's hands shifted from his sides to fold into each other in the small of his back, and Paelyn instantly realised he was going to explain something. "They are chaotic, aggressive, petty and self-centred. Do you know why?"

                Paelyn shook his head.

                "They wish to be like us."

                "Why, Garton?"

                The stocky, yet tall man kneeled down beside the younger, and curled the corner of his scarred lips upwards into a smirk. "Because we know more than them."

                A proud smile erupted onto the face of the student, "Because we know everything, right?"

                "No, Paelyn, nobody knows everything." answered Garton softly.

                "Not even us?"

                "No. Not even us."

                Paelyn was becoming concerned. He had been told he would know more than any other creature alive... But if it was not everything, then how could he hope to beat his brother? Certainly Jaroth would attempt to learn everything as well, if only to know more than Paelyn did. Nothing less than absolute knowledge would do for the young lord. "I want to know everything."

                The calm, stoic face hovering to Paelyn's right fell instantly, unusual in the almost mournful pose it had adopted. "Everything?"

                "Yes."

                Garton heard in the voice of the child the desire, the arrogance and the pride to follow through on the insane wish. He also heard the words of the father echoing through the emptiness which pervaded his thoughts at that instant, Teach the boy what he wants to know... "Very well. I will teach you everything."

                "Good." Paelyn announced, and stood, brushing off the tunic he wore. The black material held no comparison to the black in which they were engulfed. "What will we do once we know everything, Garton?"

                The teacher took no hesitation in reply. "Die, most likely."

***

                "Garton's going to teach me everything!" Paelyn announced as his footfalls found solid stone to strike as the pair came to the main hall of the castle. A derisive snort came instantly from the distance, right across the length of the cavernous hall that was being busily prepared by untold servants and drudges. Through the figures racing over the stones, around the long wooden benches, carrying a myriad of pots, dishes, platters and all manner of implements for a feast, Paelyn caught sight of his brother. He was sitting purposefully away from anyone who might contrive him to assist, fingers idly splaying the fringe of a tapestry hanging from the wall.

                "You leave that alone!" hollered Paelyn, and the shocked still that enveloped the crowd enabled him to cross the hall in a flash, vaulting benches and tables stacked with food as he made for his brother. "That's my tapestry, char for brains! Y-you-you bugger off, and fiddle around with your one!" Garton raised a hand to his face, covering his eyes softly and looking to his boots.

                Paelyn's brother, Jaroth, sitting under the tapestry merely stood up and glared at the advancing malcontent. Paelyn had every right to be upset - the tapestry he was standing under was crafted by the finest weavers in the province. The fringe hung almost to his shoulders, whereas it brushed Paelyn's; he was a good two inches taller than his older brother. The scene wrought was that of a bronze dragon, flaming across the skies. The threads chosen were all coloured and dyed individually, the loom prepared for one singular use, the whole life of the master craftsman spent weaving the gargantuan piece. It was Paelyn's birthright.

                "It's a free castle," defended Jaroth, and folded his arms tight against his stocky chest, "I'll sit wherever I feel like." He was inwardly certain though, that if Paelyn had been able to manipulate the weather like their father, he would have summoned a thunderstorm to follow him. Jaroth wasn't sure, but the air above Paelyn did seem a little darker... Or was that just his imagination?

                "Get away from my tapestry! You've got your own, go away and look at it instead! My one's going to last forever!"

                "Piffle," corrected Jaroth with a fair imitation of Paelyn himself, "you don't know how to make them last that long. Only Mordrath and Jakahl ever knew how to do that, and Jakahl was human!"

                Paelyn quirked a jet black and razor sharp brow towards the ceiling, Garton's nuances used to display what his own frustration failed to articulate. "Garton knows too, stupid! Garton's going to teach me everything!"

                "Garton? Don't make me laugh, he's too old to remember anything like that!" Jaroth's arms folded even tighter, and he planted his feet apart defensively. Over Paelyn's shoulder he saw the advancing figure of Garton, and inwardly he winced. It would not be an enjoyable meeting.

                "Ow!" A hand connected with the back of Paelyn's head.

                "Ow!" Said hand shot foward and invited itself to the side of Jaroth's head. Garton gave off a low grunt and stood to the side of the pair. With his arms folded, it was hard not to be looking at him. The pair - both agreed, which was unusual - knew that Garton in a foul mood meant they had done something to upset or annoy him, and to receive a clip across the ear, it was obviously something big.

                "Mordrath give me strength," began the gaunt old teacher, and the younger pair knew instantly they were in it, "to deal with you two and your endless squabbling! I tell you, you're like a pair of silly human boys, fighting over who-knows-what-or-why!"

                "But he threatened me!" defended Jaroth pitifully.

                "Did not! You were fiddling with my tapestry!" Paelyn shot back, confident that as always, Garton would take his side. Garton was Paelyn's instructor, not Jaroth's, and the fact that he was Weyrlingmaster for the whole of the castle meant that the pair were held in a certain degree of animosity by the other students.

                "That's enough... What would your father say if he saw you two about to pummel each other?" One long, boney finger began to tap the old man's bicep.

                "Dad's not here..." muttered Paelyn, pushing his hands into his trouser pockets. His eyes fell to the floor dejectedly. His father would have taken his side, too.

                "Hah! See! Dad's not here because he's sick of listening to you whine, little brother!" Jaroth grinned smugly, until another swipe from Garton's hand replaced all but the worried glance on his face. Paelyn still had his eyes on the floor.

                "N-no... That's not true," whimpered the boy, and sunk onto the bench behind him. His resolve tightened around his chest, bitter bile of jealousy forcing it's way up into the back of his mouth. He swallowed against it, and balled his fists, as if he could ward off the anger with them, fighting off the oppressive hatred. Garton looked down to his charge and his head fell to one side, watching the boy. Paelyn forced himself to calm down, muscle by muscle, each sinew after the other. The last thing they all needed was for him to transform right in the middle of the hall. "He wouldn't have made me the next King if he was sick of me..." he drawled, and watched Jaroth's eyes.

                The two orbs of green leapt, the forests burning instantly in them with the fires of rage. "Damn you!" He spat on the floor, "Little Prince daddies boy! Ruann is mine, you know that!"

                "No," Garton spoke, voice gravel-harsh and low, "it is not. Jaroth, you'll come with me." He put out his hand to lead the vicious boy outside, "You're going to do a spot more trading with the humans, so you can see what happens to you if you let foolish things like anger and hate fill your head. Coltyn knew that Paelyn would not let that happen," and here he knew he was taking a chance - any mention of their father taking any stance that could be considered a 'side' was a potential minefield, "so your father chose him to be the next King. Perhaps one day you can learn to be more like him."

                Paelyn nodded his approval.

                Jaroth stormed from the hall, shoving himself into Garton's offered hand and arm, heels pounding out his anger on the stones. Garton raised his other hand to his shoulder and took a sharp breath.

                "Did he hurt you, Garton?" carefully queried the young lord.

                His teacher couldn't resist a tiny smirk of reproach at the boy. "No, he didn't. And you should be calling me 'Master', you know."

                Paelyn's eyes that were then filled with triumph were lowered again to the floor, grinding a piece of dust into the stones. "I know, I know..." Then he added quickly, "But what about when you have to call me King?"

                "You may one day be King, young lord, but remember that I will always have taught you everything that you know. I will call you King not because I have to, but because by the time you are King, you will have earned the title. And my respect." He attempted a nonchalant shrug, and failed. Garton's hand around his left bicep tightened like a vice, and the whitening of the knuckles alarmed Paelyn somewhat.

                "Does that wound still hurt?"

                "Aye..."

                Paelyn set his hand onto his chin and lifted a knee up to his chest, resting his elbow onto it so he could adopt what he purposed to be a very dashing and thoughtful pose. "Did you catch the human that did it?"

                Garton's resolve fell somewhat, and a lid fell halfway across one eye reproachfully, "No. How was I supposed to? There were three of them, and they all had those things that make noise and smoke."

                "And hurt you," Paelyn added, by way of fact.

                "Yes. It hurt. Their magic is fast," and the teacher bent his head to his arm, rolling up the sleeve. Around his arm was a tightly-bound set of leaves and rope, "and it hurts like fire. Though I'm not sure if it's their magic, or if those talismans they use are given powers by a wizard from their homes."

                A drudge passed Paelyn, and the scents of fresh baked beef and ham wafted past his nostrils. "What'd Dad say about the Tal Marieh?"

                "For the time being we are to avoid them, and the Voidances in the centre of the continent from where your father supposes they come. He has every Dragonmage in Ruann working on a solution to this." Garton snatched a piece of meat from a platter not carefully enough guarded as it whisked past, and began to gleefully chew the end.

                "The Voidances are growing. The Tal Marieh's numbers are growing, too. What will we do if we are overrun by them?"

                Garton smirked challengingly, "Let them come. I haven't had a good fight in years." His open disregard for the Tal Marieh (which you or I would say as 'Tal Maray') masked a deep forboding, as he had been the first to suffer at their hands. Perhaps unintentionally, they had 'shot' him - one of the less violent of them had explained he'd been 'shot' - for fear, or self defence. They were all human, after all.

                "Far too much to think about," he finally declared, and rubbed a hand across the left side of his gnarled face, slipping the tips of his fingers over the ragged scar that ran down his cheek and sealed his eye shut. The right blinked slightly, electric blue despite the foggy spots of old cataracts. "So how old will you be this year, young lord?"

                Garton was referring, of course, to the celebrations which the hall around them - and the entire kingdom - was preparing for: Paelyn's birthday. It would be a momentus event, for the time had finally come where he was at an age where Garton would be allowed to teach him the science of magic. "I'll be one thousand this year, Garton!" Paelyn defended, rising to the bait, "I'm not a young lord anymore!"

                "Aye, boy, you are," Garton contradicted. "But, we'll just have to see about keeping those ladies off of you, won't we?"

                Paelyn quirked a brow. "Ladies?"

                "This is why I call you 'young lord.'"

***

                Eldridge, said the name on the side of the ship. The spring sun was blissfully warm on his crisp, white shirt. The gentle breeze caught the sounds of men working, welding, moving of materials, and the odd curse or two from something gone wrong. It was a naval base after all. The man in the white shirt took a breath in, and revelled in the salty zest of the coastal air, the sun high in the sky. Nothing could look better to him; the USS Eldridge floating peacefully in it's moors while the dock crews buzzed around it as bees to honey.

                He ran his eyes down the length of the grey hull and took stock of what had happened: along the bridge tower was a few extra cables, thicker than his whole body and running into the deck behind the superstructure, they were the only outward signs of Einstein's work. Einstein, the mere name brought a smile to the thin lips of the man in white, and the fingers of his right hand slipped into his pressed white trousers. The left hand reached up, and adjusted the rank slide on each shoulder, as he had to make an effort to catch the respect of his commanding officer before they were on operational duty.

                Something about the 'invisible ship' idea amused him, sneaking up on the Germans and blasting them into the depths before they knew what hit them. Einstein's formulae and good old American elbow-grease formed the bulk of the Eldridge's modifications. It occured to him then that an invisible ship could just as well be a submarine, rather than bother to put the kind of energy Einstein thought was required through the hull to degauss it, or repel some kind of electromagnetic hoodad. He was a pilot, not a scientist.

                "Lukas?" A voice to his left rear called.

                The man in the white shirt turned around and smiled warmly, facing the other white-suited male. With a flash towards his shoulder with a practised eye, Engstrom saw the other Lieutenant. 'Rickles' was written on the name plate he was wearing on his shirt. "Yeah, Jimmy? What is it now?"

                "Just checkin' out the ship, myself." Rickled put his hands onto his hips and beamed at the ship. "Exciting, ain't it? That we're gonna go and blow the Germans to kingdom come with an invisible ship!"

                Engstrom shrugged, and turned back to face the ship so that the sun could spread across his back like a wam blanket. "Do you think it'll work?"

                It was Rickles' turn to shrug then. "Dunno. Figure it'll be the most spectacular screw up in history if it doesn't. Einstein's pretty worked up, goin' on about 'Och, my hair!' wherever he goes."

                "Was he saying, 'Mein Herr' by any chance?"

                The look that Rickles shot Engstrom was the unmistakable glance of 'not getting it'. "Yeah? I think..."
                "He was saying Sir, you dimwit." The pilot let his hands fall to his sides, the sharp bite of the sea breeze cooling between his fingers pleasantly. "Even in german, I'd like to hear why it is I have to come. I'm a pilot, and the Eldridge is a destroyer - there's not a Thunderbolt, a 'Stang or any other plane at all for a good few miles of here. What sense does that make to you?"

                "You're our radar specialist," and Rickles paused, "dimwit. You've gotta tell us whether or not the modifications to the ship are working from the aerial point of view."

                An alarm went off somewhere in the distance, and Engstrom's gaze turned to spy the source of the noise. Nothing other than the slow rolling of the ship seemed out of the ordinary. "We'll see how it goes. Say, you going to come to the Officer's Club tonight? They've got an eight-piece brass coming in... Just remember that you're not supposed to tell anyone about what we're doing?"

                Rickles' face turned deadpan. "I'll try, Lukas. If I get pulled up on stage, I'll give them my name, rank, and regiment number." Engstrom rolled his eyes and ran a hand across his charcoal mop, brushing back an unruly strand from his eyes.

                "No singing, either. I've heard you, sound like a foghorn with it's balls in a vice," he quipped.

                Rickles shot him another look and just as quickly launched into the Naval rhetoric, "Remember that time out at Portsmouth when you stole the Sergeant's uniform? Poor bugger had to pull the curtain down from the shower and run out in front of the female barracks where his uniform was hanging up drying - and I didn't sing a single word of that to anybody!"

                "Except," corrected the other quickly, "for everyone in the mess when you'd ploughed through that Guinness..."

                "Guinness. Now there's beer. I haven't had one of them since... Hell, since we were at the barracks when we first met, near on six years ago, isn't it?"

                Engstrom gave a slow nod and smiled, more for the memory than for what his friend had said. "Fancy one now?"

                "Sure." Rickles batted a hand down the front of his jacket, "Dressed to kill and paid to do it. Join the United States Navy!"

                Engstrom's thin lips fired skyward in an impish smirk, "I like that idea."

***

                "I don't like that idea."

                "Why not?" Asked the human, his eyes turned mournfully towards the bars of obsidian that Jaroth was staunchly defending, feet planted apart in front of it and his arms folded over the castle's standard black tunic. "It's three carts of grain, Weyrling! Three! You could feed one hundred of your kind for a month with that, and all I want is one cart of bars in reply. I want so little, when you have so much..." Jaroth could have sworn this human was identical to the last one he had dealt with in the same day - true, as all the humans he had seen in the day - they all looked the same to him. Beady eyes, underpronounced snouts; humans really were a most unattractive race.

                "You are not getting the cart," he levelled, "I will pay you half."

                The trader's eyes flew wide open, Jaroth reflecting that they looked better that way. "Half?! That's only fifty bars! I can't make any more than five hundred slabs with that!"

                "Yes," replied Jaroth in the same, calm voice, "but it will make you near on five thousand slips. Think in the higher portion, human, and you will see that what you are getting is quite fair..." The same voice, honey sweet but dripping with contempt had sent away almost half the traders in that day. The current pair stood in a room in the lowest level of the castle.

                To the human, it looked the same as any other, four stoney walls, which were being forced into by small shoots of rebellious greenery on the southern face. A respectful size for it's simple task as a clerk's office, the far wall was devoted entirely to a bookcase stacked with yellowed scrolls, hides, leather bound books and all the required paraphernalia.

                To Jaroth, it stank. Positively reeked of the growth in the walls, untended for how many centuries. Of the oppressiveness from thousands of tons of dirt against the southern wall where the castle's edge met the cliff face it was wedged into, overlooking the valley below. Stank of curing solutions for the hides, labours and toil not his own, further compounding his misery at being there in the first place.

                The human stank almost as much, of sweat and travel, dust filtering the colour from his plain dress. It's eyes narrowed to slits - very silly for eyes already pathetically small, Jaroth decided, the effect of looking angry at him was entirely lost - and the two hands that were worn with drudgery balled into a pair of defiant fists. "I travelled three days from Hakkora to bring this to you, Weyrling, and I will not be denied what is rightfully mine. Your territories contain the largest obsidian deposits anywhere on the continent, and you do not use them... Why do you not share your wealth with us?!"

                As much as he was loathe to admit it, the human's irrational anger greatly amused Jaroth. It was acting like he would in the same situation. "Don't make me explain the laws of supply and demand to you, fool!" He shot his foot out and kicked the chair before him at the trader, walloping his fists into the bars behind him. "You will take half a cart, you will like it, and you will send the next trader for me to deal with. That, or you will perish in flames! Does that sound fair to you?"

                The trader muttered something in Hakkoran and snatched the paper Jaroth had written his orders to the miner on, slinking from the room without another word.

                It was some time, even by his standards, that Jaroth's trading for the day was done. The sun crept into it's nightly abode and the castle was plunged into the dim light of candles, yellow flickerings warming the otherwise cold stone. Jaroth sat outside, with his chin in his hands. And he thought. He thought very carefully, more carefully than he would have thought himself capable of as he was perhaps not the smartest around the castle, and as much as he hated to realise, not as smart as Paelyn. The pair quibbled endlessly over petty details, but mostly, they fought over their father. Jaroth leaned his well-muscled back against the wall, and pulled his knees up against his chest at the thought of his father, something related to apprehension tinging his emotions.

                Coltyn was like any father; he made time for his sons, found them diversions when they were bored, listened to their fantastic stories of how they had managed to turn a simple task into a great feat of derring do - but he was King first. A fine and mighty King, too, just in his reign. All the weyrkind loved him, even the humans that lived in the castle. They loved him, and he loved his people in turn, but none as much as he loved his two sons.

                Scratch that, Jaroth snapped mentally, as much as he loves Paelyn.

                Yes, his brother... Jaroth's thoughts would always drift back to that little prick. He could remember being very young, and whenever he so much as cooed, Coltyn would instantly drop what he was doing and proclaim, 'Look at the boy! Look what he can do! He makes me so proud, that boy, he's going to be just like his old man one day.' Then he would beam, and ruffle Jaroth's sandy mop of hair in front of whatever company was there, without fear or trepidation in what they thought of his love for his son.

                And then there were two... He remembered.

                As soon as that little bronze egg had been laid, there'd suddenly been less time for Jaroth. He would go to his father with stories of how he had baked bread with a thought, only to have Coltyn nod incessantly with his eyes locked on the swaddled egg. Barely the size of even his youngster's fist, Jaroth's little brother would grow to be even taller than him by the same age he was at the time. Paelyn, his father had named the boy, which in their launguage meant 'Pride'. His pride and joy, the little one. Jaroth grew to hate his father's Pride.

                Paelyn grew quickly, as their young did, and he learned. He learned veritable swathes of information, impressing his instructors so much that their father decided he would be taught by Garton, the Weyrlingmaster of the castle. He was famous throughout even the human realm of Hakkora for his legendary acts of bravery, valour, and courage in battle, and he always seemed to notice the smallest thing that Paelyn did, just like Coltyn. They noticed less and less of Jaroth.

                But Paelyn tried to like you, didn't he? Jaroth heard the little voice of reason, fighting it's way through clouds of anger and bitter jealousy, Paelyn was so very nice to you...

                In truth, he had been. Paelyn always wanted to play with Jaroth. Wherever Jaroth was, Paelyn would follow, much to Garton and Coltyn's disapproval. When the boy should have been learning his spells or his geometry, or being instructed by some human teacher under Garton's watchful, piercing eye, he would most likely be found with Jaroth, tripping over his heels in an effort to see what his brother did.

                The young lord idolised his older brother.

                But of course Jaroth did not enjoy the company of his younger brother, as is the time-honoured custom with sibling rivalry, and was as bitter as he could manage around the boy without resorting to violence, although now and again the pair had been known to squabble. By Hakkoran standards, it would have been the Fight of the Century - electric bolts, incandescent flashes of barely contained magic in the two combatants. Jaroth and Paelyn were just two boys, to the Ruannese.

                A rustle to his left roused Jaroth from his muse, and the pair of obsidian points sharpened, squeezed tight by the surrounding amber colour of his eyes. A dog, old, starving and haggard, was picking its way though the garbage at the back of the castle. Jaroth watched it for a few moments, it's despair amused him so. Here was another creature that would understand what it was to fight futility. He picked up a rock and drew precision aim, hurling it at the dog. With a half-hearted yelp, it fell to the ground, bleeding from above it's right ear.

                He collected a few small rocks from around where he sat, and advanced on the wretched thing on the ground where it lay. He stood over it and considered his options. Jaroth could have healed it, made the dog his own as Paelyn might have done and had a friend for life... But such things were of no use to him. Healing magic, he wanted nothing to do with.

                A terrible thought entered his head.

                What if that dog was Paelyn?

                That decided the matter. He lifted his hands into the air and threw stones at the dog until he was quite sure it was dead.