The God-Stone War

Chapter 4

“Feel free to explain your extremely clever reasons for not putting Rose and Dorian’s minds at ease about the next patrol,” said Penny, as we closed the door leading back to Castle Cameron. Her expression left no doubt regarding her personal opinion.

Now that we were alone, I had no reason not to give her my real justification. “First I will have your promise that this remains between the two of us,” I told her.

“Why?” she asked shrewdly.

I sighed. “If my reasoning gets back to Rose then it will defeat the purpose.”

She shook her head in resignation, “At the moment you aren’t in her good regards anyway.”

I held my ground. “Promise?”

Penny stared at me, “You really don’t want me to tell Rose?”

I nodded positively.

“Fine.”

“Dorian can’t help himself. As long as he feels he could be doing more, he will. I’m just trying to make things easier for him with Rose,” I said at last.

My lovely wife stared at me intently for a moment before she replied, “You really surprise me sometimes. Over the years you’ve really learned a lot of tact and subtlety. What really amazes me is that you can be so complex and yet still make so many mistakes.” Her face was thoughtful and one of her eyebrows twitched awkwardly.

And you my dear, have come a long way in mastering your temper. Years ago you would have simply called me an ‘idiot’ and the fight would be on, I thought silently. “You still haven’t mastered the art of lifting one eyebrow,” I said instead, raising and lowering my right brow to illustrate the point.

Penny smirked. “That doesn’t change the fact that you picked the wrong side this time. Dorian is about to be a father again. I know you well enough to know, you couldn’t possibly think he should be out in the field rather than at home with his children. You should be trying to beat that lesson through his thick skull, rather than making it easier for him.”

She had me, but I didn’t intend to admit her point yet. “The danger still exists; otherwise Dorian would not be so keen to find the shiggreth.”

“You have many other knights who are capable of managing the task for now.”

“There is only one Dorian.”

“His children deserve a father, and he deserves a family life,” she countered smoothly. “Only he can do that for them. Other knights can lead your patrols.”

I crossed my arms, a visible sign of my stubborn intent. “I believe he wants that as well, but I trust his instincts. If he thinks he needs to keep going with them, I won’t hold him back.”

She pursed her lips, staring up at me. “You’ll pay a price with Rose for this. Don’t think she’ll let you off, now that you’ve set yourself as the obstacle to her happiness.”

“What about you?” I asked.

Her hand slipped into mine and we resumed walking. “I think you’re wrong, but it isn’t worth fighting over.”

“Rose is your closest friend. Will she hold my decision against you?”

The most beautiful woman I had ever met looked at me from the corner of her eye. “I intend to let her think I’m making your life miserable at home as matter of female solidarity. Make sure she doesn’t doubt me or I’ll make the ruse into reality.”

That deserved a kiss.

The next day I met privately with Dorian after breakfast. I had considered having him eat breakfast with us, but Penny had vetoed that idea by telling me that he needed to spend the time with his own family.

Since it was just the two of us, I thought we could use the time more productively if I showed him the progress on some of my projects while we talked. I was too often forced to sit in chairs to want to spend my morning that way. So it was that we found ourselves walking down a corridor leading to a stairway.

As we walked, Dorian asked with a grin, “Aren’t you supposed to have a babysitter or some such with you?”

I gave him a sour look to reward his witty remark. “If you mean a miellte, then yes I probably should, but I gave Elaine the morning off.”

“I thought you said they were supposed to keep you under twenty four hour watch.”

I was beginning to regret sharing some of the information that Moira Centyr had given me years ago. According to her, an archmage with my extreme sensitivity should be monitored constantly, even while sleeping, to avoid unfortunate ‘accidents’.

“There are only three other wizards in existence currently. I can’t afford to keep them all occupied simply watching me,” I replied. Of course I was referring to Walter, his daughter Elaine, and his son George who had just turned eighteen, hardly a good age for the boring duty of following me around all day. “Besides,” I added, “I’m not planning to do anything remotely magical this morning, and I thought we might need some privacy for your report.”

“I’m sure Elaine was disappointed,” my friend replied, with an amused expression.

“Are you planning to tell me about your trip through Gododdin, or do you just plan on reminding me of all my other problems this morning?” I answered, slightly annoyed.

Dorian’s brow creased as his thoughts returned to the main purpose for our walk. “I don’t have very much to report, which bothers me.” As we began descending the stairs leading into the cellars beneath Castle Cameron, he said, “We saw absolutely no sign of any remaining shiggreth in Gododdin this time.”

“Which doesn’t mean they aren’t there,” I responded, “since we have no way of detecting them yet.”

“You keep saying ‘yet’, but you’ve been trying to solve that problem for years now. You should put your time and energy into something more productive.”

I ignored the subtle reproach in his statement. “I’ll find a way eventually. What do you think they are doing?” I asked. At the same time, I raised my hand and placed it against an unremarkable stone in the wall on one side of us. Hidden runes lit up in my magesight, and part of the wall slid away to reveal a secret corridor.

Dorian followed me through the opening without pause; he had been this way several times before. “I have no way of knowing,” he said, as the stone door closed behind him, “but my gut tells me that they’ve moved north and east, around the Elentir Mountains.”

“To Dunbar, eh?” I remarked. Dunbar was a kingdom to the east of the Elentir Mountains. Given the difficulty traversing the Elentirs, Lothion and Dunbar had had little commerce in the past, but historically they had had some trade with Gododdin.

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“James has given them ample warning about the threat. They closed their border with Gododdin years ago. They should be ready,” I observed.

My friend sighed. “You know they can’t keep them out. There’s no way to close the entire border. Without magic and the proper tools they will be overrun no matter what they do.” He patted the enchanted sword he wore at his waist. He wasn’t wearing the magical plate today; six months on the road had given him a strong desire to avoid armor for a while.

I led him through another door, this one over a foot thick and composed entirely of iron. It opened into a spherical room that was fifty foot across from side to side and twenty five foot from floor to ceiling. In fact, the floor was a wooden platform that had been built across the middle of the chamber. Below the wood at our feet, the thick iron walls extended downward another twenty five feet. We stood inside a perfect bubble of iron, deep below Castle Cameron, a bubble with walls a foot thick.

Dorian gazed around us at the foreboding black walls. Naturally his eyes could not see the runes and patterns etched into the iron, but then again, neither could mine. I had designed the enchantment using a similar structure to the one that hid the secret room within the Illeniel house in Albamarl, with a few distinct and very important differences.

He spoke again, “You never told me where you got the iron for this thing. It must have cost a fortune.”

I smiled. “It didn’t cost a thing. The earth itself provided the materials.” By that, I meant that I had used my abilities as an archmage to coax the earth into providing the raw iron. I had brought the metal up from the hot mantle miles below us. In a very similar manner to the way a bubble of air rises in water, my iron bubble had arisen through earth and stone before settling here.

Shaking his head in disbelief, Dorian replied, “You could be the richest man in Lothion, no, in the world, if you used that trick to your advantage.”

I didn’t bother telling him it would be almost as simple to bring up vast quantities of other metals. Though iron was the most common metal, I could easily have produced enough silver and gold to destroy the economy and render the precious metals much less precious. “There comes a point my friend, when money is no longer a goal, just another tool, another means to an end. Besides, my wife and children, and friends like you… I am already the richest man in the world.”

“Ha!” he exclaimed, which I took to mean Dorian couldn’t think of a good reply… either that or he was simply too embarrassed. After a moment he changed the subject. “You never explained the full reasoning for this massive underground chamber. Will all this iron really protect the ‘God-Stone’ from the other gods?” God-Stone was the name we had taken to using for Celior’s jewel-like prison.

I stared hard at my friend, considering how much I should tell him. I had hidden my true reason for constructing the ‘Ironheart’ chamber. That was the name I had given the room when I first demonstrated it to the Knights of Stone. Standing at the exact center of the room, on a small pedestal, was a large pulsing yellow gem. The light shining from it was so brilliant that it was difficult to look at without shading your eyes. It was encased within another stone; an orange citrine colored stone that I had convinced the earth to grow around it. The light emanating from the stone within was so great that it was impossible to tell that it was actually a stone within a stone just by looking at it.

The outer gem collected the excess power from the stone inside it. It also provided the means for siphoning off that power and using it productively. I had broken pieces of it off and mounted them in many items; particularly in the newer swords I had crafted for the Knights of Stone. I had designed those swords to channel the energy they received, producing great gouts of flame upon command of the user. The blades themselves were designed to serve as rune channels. Thus the magical flame they produced could be used to reduce any shiggreth unfortunate enough to encounter them to cinders within seconds.

All of my knights bore the ‘sun-swords’ now, well… all except for Dorian. His unusual nature, as a stoic, prevented him from activating the enchantment that released the divine fire. In order to prevent the swords being stolen and used against us, I had keyed each one to its owner and it relied upon a tiny amount of the wielder’s aythar to activate the enchantment. Because of Dorian’s special nature, he was utterly unable to channel even the tiniest amount of aythar.

Returning my thoughts to his question, I considered the iron walls around us. I had told no one of their secret purpose; not for lack of trust, but for fear of discovery. I could not be entirely certain how great the shining gods’ information gathering skills were. I believed that they were limited to knowledge gathered by their followers, either directly or indirectly, but I couldn’t be perfectly sure. “I thought I explained it all to you previously,” I said at last.

He shook his head, “No, you went on and on about the stone and those fancy swords that won’t work for me.”

“This chamber is completely undetectable when the door is closed. Even the gods could not find it. It serves to protect the hiding place of our divine prison,” I said, pointing at the glowing rock in the middle of the room.

Dorian grunted, “I can think of at least nineteen other people who know where it is located.” He was referring of course to his fellow knights. I had brought each of them down to see the source of power for their swords.

I smiled, “I trust them implicitly.”

“As do I,” he replied, “but men are men and tongues will wag.”

“It has already been several years, and still they have not come. Either our secret is safe, or the gods fear to confront me,” I argued.

“You have me there,” said Dorian. “But if they do come for it, do you really want the confrontation to happen here, beneath your very home?”

“I cannot keep a close eye on it if it is kept far away. And I have made preparations to protect our families, you know that.”

“Aye, but I just want to make sure you’ve still got it in mind,” he answered, and then his expression changed. “I’ve been meaning to ask you but I never seem to get around to it.” His eyes drifted to the stone again.

“What?”

“Why does it look different?”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

He pointed, as if that would make his meaning clearer. “The stone; it looks different than it did when you first defeated him.”

I sighed. “That’s easy enough, depending on exactly what difference you are referring to… either the encasing stone, or the overall glow.”

Dorian waved his hand, “Nah, I understand about the stone that encases it. You explained that already, but the glow does seem different.”

“Look here,” I said, gesturing to a small crystalline arrangement of stones that rested beside the central pedestal. There were ten thumb sized stones in a row and each of them had a column of nine small stones beneath it. Currently nine of the large stones glowed with a yellow light. Beneath those nine stones the smaller stones also glowed. The tenth stone was unlit, as were all but one of the small stones.

“You showed me the gauge thing before,” he said, dismissing it.

“Then pay closer attention this time,” I said with some irritation. “When I first created this device, all ten stones were lit. I call that value ‘1 Celior’.”

“I still don’t understand why you measure a god’s power using his own name,” said my friend grumpily.

“He was the first thing I tried to measure, so I used his name… now listen. The power the stone contained at that point in time I have labeled, ‘1 Celior’. I don’t want the stone to contain more than that, because I don’t know for certain how much it will hold before it breaks. So, I use one Celior as the limit beyond which we know that things are no longer safe,” I told him.

“So exactly what does it mean, when it looks like this?”

“Nine large stones being lit denote nine-tenths of one Celior in charge. The extra small stone there shows another one-hundredth. That means the total power stored within the God-Stone is currently at ninety-one-hundredths of a Celior, or you could say it is at ninety one percent,” I explained.

Dorian smirked, “He’s not going to be happy when he finds out you’ve turned his name into a unit of measure. What does all that have to do with the stone looking different?”

“Well… it changes the brightness and color slightly, though I’m amazed you can see the difference. Most people are so dazzled by the light, that they have trouble seeing small differences,” I replied.

Dorian made an odd noise, a sort of ‘harrumph’, which indicated he wasn’t that impressed. “It has never looked particularly bright to me.”

He can’t see the magical light, I realized. Over time I had learned that some things which were visible to me were difficult for normal people to see, and other things were downright invisible to them. What I hadn’t considered, was the fact that because Dorian was a stoic, there might be some things that even normal people could see that he could not. In this case, his utter inability to see any magic at all left him seeing only the most mundane light, produced as a side effect of the concentration of Celior’s power. In other words, the stone only appeared to glow moderately to his eyes. As a result, he could see the actual physical stone, while most people couldn’t see past the intense glare; even worse he had noticed a difference.

“I forget you don’t perceive some of the magical glow that other people see,” I told him, in a bored tone that was entirely feigned. “It does look different though, even to your eyes, as the power level stored within it varies over time. I don’t know how else to explain it.”

He rubbed his bearded chin. “It probably doesn’t matter. I just wanted to make sure you had noticed. You know a lot more about these matters than I do, that’s for certain.”

I smiled and put a hand on his shoulder. “Speaking of matters I know better than you… have you really considered the consequences of continuing to lead patrols? Your wife is not going to be happy if you keep trying to wipe out the shiggreth single-handedly.”

Dorian gave me a wide eyed glance, as if I had already betrayed him. “I thought you understood, and I’m not doing it single-handedly. There are always at least nine other knights with me, not to mention the men at arms.”

I used my extra inch of height to look down my nose in what I hoped was a paternal glance. “You have one child now and another soon to arrive. What is your greater duty, fatherhood or knighthood?”

He frowned. “Considering I am your knight, I should think you would prefer I prioritize my knightly vows over other considerations… and I only go every other patrol.”

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that. We were friends long before I became a noble or you a knight. As a father myself, and as your friend, I cannot help but think you are going about things ass-backwards,” I said brusquely.

“If you truly feel that way then why did you tell Rose you still wanted me on the patrols?” he asked suspiciously.

“I know how stubborn you are. I was hoping I could talk some sense into you rather than give Rose good cause to make your life hell.” My stare was piercing.

Dorian looked back without flinching. “I want to be here, for Rose, for my children, but I can’t rest yet, Mort.”

“That’s not…” I started to interrupt but my friend held up his hand.

“Hear me out,” he said, and once I had closed my mouth, he continued. “I can’t explain this as well as you might. You’ve always had the words, you and Marcus both, but I don’t… so be patient and listen.” He took a deep breath and stared at his hands before holding them up for me to look at them. “I’m a man of my hands, Mordecai. I don’t always know what to say, but these hands always know what needs doing.”

Staring at them, I noted for the hundredth time the multitude of scars that marked his large, rough hands. Dorian had had large hands and feet even when we were young, and much like a puppy he had grown into them. Now there was little about him that was small, from his broad shoulders to his powerful legs, yet in my mind, I still saw that awkward youth, tall and gangly, with oversized hands and feet. Time passes too quickly, and in doing betrays us all. My friend and I were no longer children, but men with children of our own.

“They’re out there Mort, somewhere, and not as far as we’d like. They know you, and they know me. They know where we sleep and where our children play. They are neither alive nor dead and they will never rest until they have had their vengeance, upon us and every other man, woman, and child alive.” He stopped for a moment and then repeated himself, “They will never rest… and neither will I, not until they are dust, or I am.”

A long minute passed before I replied, “There will always be an enemy or threat. Once the shiggreth are gone, we will still face the shining gods, and after them the dark gods, and after them… who knows? We can never be completely safe, and if we spend our entire lives trying, then we’ll wake up one day and find our time spent and none of it on the things and the people we loved.”

The massive man who had grown from my weedy childhood friend, gave a deep grunt and looked at me from beneath dark heavy brows. “Men I can fight, and thanks to you and this sword, the dead as well. Gods and their kin I leave to you. Once the shiggreth are done, I will stay home and tend the hearth, until you command me to rise again, whether against human foes or for some other purpose. But until the dead stay in their graves, I will not rest.”

“And if I command you to set that sword aside and stay home?”

Dorian’s jaw clenched. “Don’t do that Mort. I’ve never broken my word or vow, but if you force my hand…”

Letting out a deep breath, I stepped forward and hugged the stubborn giant. “I was just making sure my friend. If this is really your choice, I will not keep you from it. We’ll find a way to end this quickly, for both your sake and the sake of your children. Until then, I’ll take the blame from Rose. I can do that much for you easily enough.”