Coil of Worlds

The jangle of koti harnesses intruded into Lukar’s thoughtful examination of the village. His animal shifted under him until he impatiently quieted it with a jerk on the reins. The beast twitched its long neck with force, sharing its dislike of his rider. The beast of burden was a tall but powerful animal. Its legs were stout, giving the animal the strength to carry large loads of supplies. With its longer, striped forelegs, the koti’s sloped back required a saddle that kept its rider vertical.

Lukar ran his gaze up and down the rows of men attacking the village walls. Their previous conquests giving them confidence, his men had attacked at sunrise with an overabundance of zeal. Without being told, his commanders ensured the men’s zeal didn’t make them foolish.

He was surprised the village’s guardians showed a decent level of courage in their endeavor to save their home. Fortunately, his military and the tactics they’d attained through past sieges would prevail. It was inevitable. If he cared to know the village’s name, he would have demanded one of the Pyranni slaves to tell him. Since it was soon to be razed, he was indifferent to the fact. The place simply served a purpose.

Although the village was off the established route to Gharra, the number of warriors in his army required a large amount of time spent gathering supplies. Each defeated village and city supplied his men during their journey with flour and other necessary supplies. They hadn’t been on the road a full week, and already his men supplemented their foodstuff with game from the surrounding forest. Lukar calculated the size of the village, attempting to determine the number of days it would supply his army.

The crash of rocks drew his attention back to the gate, where the most intense fighting took place. He nodded his head once in satisfaction. The walls surrounding the main entrance were now nothing but individual bits of clay, completely demolished by the battering ram they used. His trained men had found the weakest link in the fortification through systematic testing of the walls.

Neglect was this village’s last blunder. Their walls had gone to disrepair over the years, leaving them vulnerable to attack. His lips curled into a mocking sneer at their leader’s ignorance—or worse yet, his negligence.

When he next grinned, Lukar’s smile changed the stark emptiness always present in his face into a chilling mask. His black eyes and sunken cheeks often made his own warriors flinch. He relished their visceral reaction. Fear was a strong incentive for their enduring loyalty. Deterioration of his physical form over the years had progressed until he was emaciated.

And yet, Lukar could feel the power flowing through his veins. An honor guard shielded him from any enemy’s strike. Ironic, since he could kill every single one of his guardsmen without taking more than a single breath.

His reflexes, despite his physique, were faster and stronger than any man. He hadn’t fought with true skill against another since his coronation. With his strength and speed, his renowned mastery as a swordsman languished. Only his trusted councilors dared to draw their weapons in a sparring match against him.

Lukar felt the first stirring of hunger in the pit of his stomach. He glanced up at the sun’s location. It was too soon, too early for his desires to torment him. He and his war council gorged themselves on the flesh of men and women at night, ensuring satiation kept their desires to a minimum during the day. Otherwise, they’d lose their powers at a crucial moment while they marched. As the King of Malirra, he couldn’t afford to show weakness in front of his men.

He turned his head to look at the man bound to his koti. His chosen prey stood staring down at his toes. Lukar nodded to himself, thinking this one knew his rightful place. The man accepted his role as a sacrificial offering to his new king. One of his councilors had captured him the night before while scouting the area. If only others would show similar acquiescence for their fate.

The man, like the village before him, would meet his destined end. Once his army finished their rampage of its walls and everything in between, no one would recognize it. The village’s foundation would be decimated. He gained some satisfaction knowing no map would carry its name after today.

Now that the wall had given way, Lukar watched his men defeat the village guards—a simple enough task for his accomplished military. Even from where he sat on the koti, he knew when the screams began. Taking that as his cue to enter the once proud village, Lukar spurred his mount forward. By the time his contingent of men accessed the gate, a few buildings already emitted smoke and flames from their depths. He rode through the center of the village, judging the length of time it’d take his men to seize the possessions of its people.

He turned his head to look at his military commander—a stout man who bristled with weapons—and gave the order, “Give our men enough time to gather any item of value. We march to nightfall.”

“What of the people?” Duxon asked.

He shrugged. “Use them, kill them, or bind them, I don’t care. You decide.”

My King, I’ll relay the command,” the commander said. Lukar watched with dispassionate eyes as the commander turned his animal away to find his officers. Perhaps the next city would provide a better challenge for his men.

¤¤¤

Lara was ripped out of a sound sleep by the confusing sounds of shouting around her. Her pillow tensed beneath her, and she realized Skye’s large frame cushioned her from the ground’s rocky surface. Still muddled from her slumber, it took her a few seconds to piece together where they were. She twisted her head around, looking around.

Her stomach tumbled into a freefall.

They weren’t at the Tal’Ai training school; instead, they were in a medium-sized cavern. The room’s low-lying ceiling gave off the feeling of an impending cave-in. On her right, Lara saw a solidly built wall that stretched across the entire cavern. An arched gate stood twenty yards away from where she lay spread-eagle on the ground. Words floated down to them. With Skye’s help, she rolled off him and stood up. The prickling bubbles grazing her skin like fine champagne told her the stronghold was a large city. She assumed the wall kept the contact from becoming too intense.

Ignoring the combative questions raining down upon them, Skye turned his head and looked at her, his eyes a couple of inches off kilter. With a complete lack of irony, he said, “We’re not at the Tal’Ai training school.”

She winced. They were most definitely not at the school. In fact, Lara had no idea where they were. If the Kurites yelling at them was any indication, they were in a mountain of trouble. It probably wasn’t a good idea to ignore the people on the wall, but she followed Skye’s lead.

“No, we’re not.” She rolled her eyes. That was the understatement of the year.

“How did we get here?” he asked with only a hint of accusation.

She threw up her hands. How should she know? In exasperation, she retorted, “I told you it isn’t an exact science. Somehow, I magically appear in a tunnel. Normally I land close to Chion, but since he’s nowhere around, I’m guessing that didn’t happen.”

He turned away to search out the voices. “I don’t know where we are either. Perhaps we should ask them,” he offered, waving his hand toward the wall.

The formidable looking gate trundled upward, and a band of fully armed warriors crossed the threshold. “Uh, Skye, I don’t think asking them a question is an option. A group of soldiers just left the city and are coming toward us.”

He cursed loud enough that she heard him, but stopped in mid-sentence. “From which direction do they approach?”

She grabbed both his arms and physically twisted him around until he was facing the danger. “We can try talking to them, but the pakas aren’t with us. I doubt they’re going to feel sympathetic to our plight.”

“I agree. I don’t wish to fight them, but if they choose not to listen, then we may have a skirmish.”

She caught wind of the emotions exuding from the guards. “Yeah, I really don’t think they’re interested in listening.”

As the Kurites came closer, their aggression entrapped her in its web. Unable to control the strong emotion, she bared her lips and growled, the sound coming from deep within her throat.

Skye stepped into her, using his large frame to crowd out other distractions. Without turning his attention away from the approaching threat, he snapped, “Remember your training. You can control this. You must.”

Another feral growl escaped before she could stop it. Lara took in a deep breath through her nose, trying to calm her mind, dissociating herself from the external stimuli. She was more than the magic imposed on her. She could fight this. She wasn’t helpless, and Skye needed her.

She turned her energy to creating a watery world around her. Her image almost dissipated when Skye stepped forward again, but she kept it by the skin of her fingertips by immersing her thoughts into the sensation of floating in water. The longer she kept working on the mental image, the easier it was to mold around her.

She opened her eyes, and her sight shifted for a moment before expanding back to its normal range. In its place she saw a hazy, bluish film surrounding her like a cell’s ectoplasm. Though it had felt longer, the protective shell had taken mere seconds to create. Through the watery vision, Lara watched as the guards spread out, placing them in the center of their spears.

A scarred woman barked, “A Pyranni. A Malirran. Both found trespassing on Kureto lands. None of my guards saw you walk through the cavern field. How did you appear in front of our gates?”

Skye spoke with a measure of calm that belied their situation. “It is a long tale that should be told over a tankard of ale.” His statement provoked their surrounding guards to press the sharp tips of their spears into their skin. Lara didn’t move a hairsbreadth in any direction for fear she’d be skewered.

In reaction to the show of force, Skye lifted his hands in submission. “We fell asleep somewhere far away and woke here outside your city walls.” The woman scoffed, and he insisted, “It’s true. We were traveling to the Tal’Ai training school where the High Council sent us for training.”

The woman’s eyes shifted at his words before hardening once again. Lara felt the suspicion and mistrust like a sharp arrow attempting to splice her fragile barrier. She focused harder on her mental image, praying it stuck this time.

The Kurite sneered and drew a fine line of blood on Skye’s throat in retaliation. “Let’s hope no other city has succumbed to your devious words. I can’t imagine you’d join their ranks so soon after Malirran invaders conquered your Pyran city, Valorri. You won’t manipulate your way into our gates. The God and Goddess prevail here.”

Skye tried again, explaining, “Lara is not a Malirran spy. She hails from Abanis, a kingdom far north of here. And I…I claim Kureto as my own.”

Lara opened her mouth to add her voice to Skye’s, but she stopped herself. She didn’t know whether her tenuous shield would hold if her concentration wavered for even a second. When Lara felt the woman’s eyes on her, making the hair on her neck stand up, she looked up and stared back with the beginnings of indignation.

“And you. You don’t speak a word in your defense,” the woman accused, scanning her clothing from top to bottom. “Your presence and your clothing are suspicious.”

Both Skye and Lara wore the same clothes they’d worn upon falling asleep in the empty building. She wore a pair of jeans, a black, long-sleeved shirt—minus the strip off the bottom, and a hoodie. Lara kept her mouth sealed shut. To lose her magical barrier would amplify their problems tenfold.

A sharp point nudged her in the back, and the prickle of pain pushed her past her breaking point. Right before she lost the image, she gasped and widened her eyes in a last ditch effort to regain control.

Lara whispered in despair, “Oh, no.”

Skye turned around in total disregard of the weapons trained on them. She had enough time to stare up at Skye in horror. But not enough to warn him.

Her Tal’Ai magic took over.

She groaned at the rollercoaster of emotions that pressed into her skull, threatening to roll her under like so many times before.

Not again. Not now.

As she fought her lungs from locking down, Lara felt multiple lacerations across her skin before the steel tips retreated. She’d pushed herself onto the ends of the weapons in her shock. Left alone to fight off the feelings of suspicion, disgust, and fear battering her, she curled inward, sinking to the ground in a vain attempt to make herself a smaller target. With the emotional onslaught, the shouting was like static, background noise that couldn’t be separated into individual syllables.

In involuntary reaction, she screamed Chion’s name with everything in her. She needed his presence. Almost overwhelmed, she repeated his name like a talisman.

She imagined Chion’s faraway voice. His voice held shock and worry. Solara?

In her desperation, she latched onto the remembered sound of his voice. Pain shredded her plea into a breathless rasp of words, Lara. My name. Call me Lara.

She was going crazy, imagining a conversation with the paka.

Skye’s familiar voice penetrated her downward spiral. “Lara, control your magic. Lara.”

At his entreaty, she resolved to try one last time. She could do this. She shoved every bit of emotional turbulence away and rebuilt her watery veil around her one excruciating drop at a time. Several times she faltered, almost giving up on the impossibility of the task, and doubt grew.

She persevered. Finally, she lifted her head to find every inch of her slick with sweat. Lara straightened to her full height, keeping the image firmly in place around her, making sure it covered every bit of her body. She took in the commotion around her.

Her hard-won victory had never come at a better time. Skye knelt on the ground with a sword’s sharp edge held against his throat, his arms restrained by two guards. This time, she knew her shield would hold when she spoke aloud, and her confidence soared.

She took a partial step forward, holding out her hands to stop the strike. “Please, don’t kill him.”

Without removing the sword from his throat, the woman demanded, “Why should I listen to you?”

Afraid the woman would dismiss her, Lara’s words tripped over themselves, “Skye can’t call himself a Pyranni, not anymore. The bond he holds with a paka won’t allow him entrance into Pyran. In Malkese, we endured a trial where we both received a chance to become Tal’Ai warriors. As Skye said, I am not a Malirran. I’m an Abani.”

“Why should I believe you?”

At the woman’s question, Lara’s fear receded an inch from full blown panic. She glanced around her and realized the others also weighed her words. She retested the stability of the watery shell.

“Because you are right. Skye would never side with a Malirran. We recently discovered they are cannibals.” She shivered at the visual her own words resurrected. Lara saw the poor woman’s mutilated body, the woman’s fear engraved on her face. “They are evil, and the Malirran we found was killed by him,” she said, motioning toward Skye. “The Malirran we found had just killed a woman a little older than me.”

Their suspicion beat at her, yet she was thankful the woman restrained from killing Skye. After a moment’s pause, the head guard removed her weapon from Skye’s neck and nodded at the others to release him. Skye didn’t make any sudden moves for a few seconds. He then lowered his arms but stayed on his knees, keeping himself at their mercy. Still in the midst of several spears, Lara couldn’t do anything but wait for the woman’s decision.

Chion’s faint words reached her, My Lady?