Showing posts with label Anias. Show all posts

It was late by the time Anias trudged into Hillsboro. Weary from the journey Anias walked slowly down the main street of the small hamlet and made his way towards the Traveler’s Rest, a tavern were he would bed down for the night. In an alley on the right hand of the street a man watched him from the shadows.

After Anias passed the mouth of the alley the man emerged and began to follow Anias down the street, and moved quickly to catch up.

“Anias, son of Hal?” the man asked, his speech terse.

Anias turned around slowly, and looked the man up and down. He was most likely a farmer. He was covered from head to foot in dirt, and his cloths were torn and worn, hardly enough to keep him warm in the middle of winter. The man looked pale and his lips were blue, he must have been standing outside for some time. He didn’t seem to mind being so cold, as he stood there without shivering or chattering his teeth.

“Excuse me, have we met?” Anias asked cautiously. Something about the way the man was looking at him made him nervous.

Anias extended his hand.

“You seem to have me somewhat at a disadvantage, you are?”

The man made no reply, he only stood there staring savagely at Anias, his breathing heavy as if he had been hard at work.

Anias waited a moment for the man to say something. Trying to stay calm he continued on, dropping his hand back to his side.

“Well, whatever your business is with me friend, let us speak about it indoors, it is cold out here. Come, I will buy you a drink.”

Anias turned and headed towards the tavern. Hopefully there would be other people in the tavern. Anias kept his head turned slightly to the left so he could keep an eye on the man out of the corner of his eye. After he had walked fifteen feet the other man began to follow. Anias turned his head back towards the tavern satisfied with the distance between himself and the stranger.

The stranger followed behind slowly at first. From under the folds of his shirt he drew a dagger. With each step he moved faster until he was running at Anias, his face contorted with a bizarre mixture of glee and rage.

The man was close by the time Anias heard him and turned just in time to see him leap in the air dagger raised above his head. As the man fell through the air Anias raised his hand and muttered a few words, and shut his eyes tight. Brilliant white light exploded from his hand making the dark street bright as day. Stunned the stranger tumbled onto Anias knocking both men to the ground; the stranger rolled off Anias, moaning and rubbing his eyes.

Anias got to his feet and clumsily drew his sword. As he did this he backed as quickly as he could towards the tavern, keeping his eyes on the stranger, who was struggling to his feet and wiping tears from his eyes. The stranger looked back and forth several times before his eyes focused on Anias. He snarled and bent over feeling on the ground for his dagger. Once it was in hand again he charged. Anias stopped backing up and raised his sword above his head. When the man came close Anias stepped towards the right away from the mans knife hand and swung the flat of his blade at the side of the man’s head. The stranger was not quick enough to duck and Anias’ sword connected with a resounding THWACK. The stranger crumpled to the ground and did not stir. Blood trickled from the wounded skin and mingled with the snow.

Anias turned and ran toward the tavern for help.

A man sat alone upon a green hill, leaning on his blood spattered shield. He sat overlooking a field filled with the day’s grizzly work, a battle, and now it was just another graveyard. As he sat he wondered who had won this day, perhaps only the crows for whom his comrades had become a feast. Men had fought and died here today for their lords, and for what? All they had risked had been for a man that hardly knew them. At least he risked his skin for gold crowns, something he could hold onto after the fighting was over.

There was something about sitting amongst the dead that made him thoughtful. Perhaps it gave him time to reflect on his own mortality. Most things made a lot more sense in that light.

Land was what they had fought for today, and by the gods they had it. “Look at them littered all over it”, he muttered to himself. More land so some noblemen could have more prestige, and more servants, and more crops. Several of those men had been his friends. There was no rule that a sellsword couldn’t have friends. He pictured Lord Edderfield Clark at that moment, and how satisfying it would be to run the pudgy coward through with his blade. Now there was a cause worth fighting for. At least his friends would be able to rest easy then.

He’d nearly died himself in the fighting. After the initial cavalry charge Clark had send in a quarter of his foot in to keep Count Olsen’s men distracted, and as his precious knights had ridden away Clark ordered his archers to volley the field until Olsen’s men were all dead.

His horse had been cut from under him earlier and so he had had to survive as best he could, along with the rest of the poor foot soldiers. He’d been under his shield half the battle trying to keep the arrows off his back. As the battle disintegrated into more of a frightened mob of men trying each to save himself, Conall had hidden himself beneath his fallen horse. Between his horse’s body and his shield he had stayed safe till the battle was over.

Conall had fought in many battles over the years and looking down at dead and dying vowed this was his last. He’d earned enough money that he would never have to go looking for work like this again. His reputation as a swordsman was great enough that perhaps he could retire and become an instructor or a body guard, anything but this. It just wasn’t worth it anymore. Long ago when he had been young he had left home looking for his fortune, for purpose, and for glory. All he had found were petty kings and tyrants each looking to himself. All the old heroes had faded away an age ago and left in their stead quarreling boys. He would give them his sword no longer. None of them deserved it.

The surface of the lake which Anias sat next to was frozen solid, and a light dusting of snow blew across its surface. For the last few minutes he had been watching the weather. He knew little about weather patterns but to him it looked like a big storm was blowing in from out of the north. From here he could see the surface compound that led down into the old college of sorcery. Its white marble walls lay in ruin, and past them in the middle of a courtyard an old fountain could be seen. It had taken him several hours of searching through rubble when he had first arrived there to find a way down into the college itself, the main entrance had partially collapsed.

If the storm was going to be a blizzard it would probably be the first heavy snow, making travel much harder. If he didn’t go now, the snow would be a lot higher the next time he tried. It would only take him half a days hike to make it to the great pine forest not far to the south west, and once there he would be secluded from the icy winds of the storm. On the other hand getting caught out in a blizzard didn’t really seem like all that good of an idea either.

Having made up his mind Anias stood, shouldered his pack and began to make his way towards Hillsboro. The storm seemed far away for the time being.

The going was slow. The snow was already a foot deep and it was no task for an old man. It was nightfall before he reached the safety of the woods. Once there he set himself up a camp and shelter. Searching through the trees he gathered deadwood and pine branches with his hatchet. Pine branches made for a great shelter, and insulation, and dry needles would make for a good fire starter. Finding the dry needles took some digging through the snow but they were there. Even with those things it was a long cold night.

The blizzard hit in the night, blanketing the land in several feet of snow before morning, and just as quickly as it had arrived, it was gone. The hiking once Anias returned to the open plain was miserable.

The next few days passed slowly, though there were a lot of things to occupy his thoughts and his time. Getting supplies to the academy was going to be a problem. He really didn’t want to reveal its position to the world, and if he brought a wagon driver and some muscle to move boxes along with him, word was sure to get out about such a marvelous place. He supposed near his death he would tell someone about what he had found but until then he wanted the place to himself. He didn’t think he could get several months worth of supplies back to the academy by himself.

The second problem was the well itself. Something seemed to be wrong with it. Why would someone engineer a place to make such a peculiar vibrating sound? It permeated the whole compound, and it would have driven him nuts. Perhaps if the well had been drawing in energy from its surroundings for so long without having energy drawn from it, it had become too full, it contained too much energy. Even if all that was true, great, so what was he supposed to do about it? Its not like he could make it all magically disappear. Well, okay, maybe he could magically make it disappear, so to speak, but he had no idea as to how.

Regardless of what he was going to do about the other things Anias firmly resolved to get a pair of those snow shoes, it had been bad foresight on his part to venture up here without them.

Joint pain, that was the one penalty of old age that Anias resented the most. It seemed like he might never stand again when he woke in the mornings. Under his warm fur blankets he began to absently rub at his aching joints. Next to him in the fire place, the last dying embers of his fire gave off the only illumination in the room, and beyond their feeble light it was pitch black.

Sitting up Anias seized his staff and muttered a few unintelligible words. To the untrained what Anias’ words caused seemed simple and elegant, however much more was involved then a few words. By stilling his mind and concentrating he had channeled the very energies of creation and reshaped the universe to his will. Even the simplest spell could be dangerous, for if he lost control of it there was no telling how the universe would be reformed.

This time brilliant white light illuminated the room, casting long shadows amongst the stacks of books. Anias set his staff against the wall so that he could rekindle the fire and make himself breakfast. Taking out some grain meal he mixed it with water in a pot and placed it on the fire to heat. He wanted to be off as soon as possible to Hillsboro to gather the supplies he would need to make this place into more of a home. Then the real work could begin.

In the darkness not far from where Anias slept, two lives were about to end.

“Hannah, Hannah wake up. Get your things, we have to go.”

In her bed the child moaned softly.

“Mother what is it? I’m tired.”

That was the same question Leda had been asking herself. Five minutes ago her husband had come at her from behind with a rolling pin, shouting and snarling. Now he sat in a catatonic state in the middle of the dirt floor in the next room, drool running down from his lip. Leda thanked the gods above for the darkness, she didn’t want Hannah to see the blood running down from her wounded head. Uric had always been kind to her, but lately he had been acting strangely. Two nights previous he had become furious at dinner and thrown his bowl across the room at her. Immediately after he apologized saying that he knew not what had come over him. He also seemed to be tired and irritated. Over the last week and a half he had taken to sleeping till noon, and frequently napped. He spent more time asleep then awake. Leda thought he was just coping with some illness, but there had to be something else wrong with him. Some times he would stare at her, so hatefully that it made her weep when he was gone. Now it had all culminated in this. The man in the next room could not be her Uric.

“Just get your things dear, we’re going to stay at Rebecca’s house for a while.”

Rebecca was the daughter of her best friend and Hannah’s play mate. Leda did not know where else she could turn.

After Hannah had gathered up her doll, blanket, and extra pair of cloths Leda took her by the hand and led her past her husband in the next room.

“Momma” Hannah whimpered, “What’s wrong with daddy?”

“Come on Hannah” Leda said, nearly having to drag her child away from her father. “We have to go!”

Leda had just made it through the door when she heard a snarl come from behind.

“Where” Uric growled, “do you think that you're going?”

The only thing that could escape her mouth before Uric fell upon her was “Hannah, run!”

If the child had ran right away as her mother had instructed she might have escaped, but she was unable to move as she watched horrified while her father battered her mother with the rolling pin.

Hannah turned, weeping, and fled for the forest not fifty feet away. She had made it to the tree line when her father caught her, and drug her kicking and screaming back to the house. The sobs and screams of the two women did not last much longer that night.

In the morning the villagers found Uric in his house, rocking back and forth, with his daughter and wife cradled in each arm, tears streaming down his face. For a small community such a loss was bitter indeed, but the grief of Uric was the bitterest of all for he could not remember what had happened to his family last night.

Waving his hand, Anias produced a small light upon the tip of his walking stick. Staff in one hand and his other resting on the pommel of his old sword, he began to make his way towards the inner recesses of the complex. “I am in way over my head here,” he mused to himself as he walked the dusty halls of Vulgaris’ great underground labyrinth. The tremors coming from the Well simply struck him as odd. “Should it be shaking and vibrating like that?” He had no idea. Putting such thoughts aside he continued on. More then anything else Anias felt alive, vibrant with energy he had not possessed since his youth. To finally see his life’s work complete, to have discovered this place, it was all too much. His only regret was that he had not found the Well until the twilight of his life. Next spring he would be eighty-six. Few guessed he was that old, since part of his hair was still a dull black, and there was yet some strength in his arm. They had called him crazy when at the age of seventy-one he had sold all of his worldly possessions and begun his search for this place. Not bad for a crazy old man. If it took him the rest of his life to explore it the time would not have been misspent. So far every sight had surpassed even his greatest hopes and expectations. The room he walked into next took his breath away.
As far as the eye could see there were books. Stacks of books, shelves filled with books, and desks covered in closed and open books. From where he stood he could see upwards to the chamber’s vaulted ceiling, and rising on every side were pillars supporting other floors. The place was at least four stories of knowledge, more then he could ever hope to sift through. No where in the entire world was there such a collection of books. Dumbfounded he stopped to take it all in.
Since he had begun his search for this place his research had taken him from one country to another, pluming the depths of ancient repositories of knowledge and history. Every book he had ever gone through was probably here. The books on the shelves look as if they were in excellent condition, something that seemed impossible in the light of the fact that they were all so old. The walls thrummed with eldritch power, and he could feel enchantment in the air. Perhaps those who had once lived here had used their power to preserve the knowledge in this room.
The only thing more powerful then his curiosity was his weariness. It was time to rest. After returning to the surface for some wood, Anias settled down next to the warmth and light of a fire he built in a fireplace near the back of the library, and dreamt of the endless possibilities amongst the knowledge of the ages. For him, it seemed, life had only just begun.

Writer's note: This section will probably get a serious overhall seeing as how I wrote most of it at one it the morning, and as for other editing tasks, I'll get around to that sometime tommorow, today its time for studying. Also, anyone know how to get this thing to tab? It let me get away with it yesterday but not today.

Unwrapping the leather packaging around his dried foodstuffs, he popped a piece of salty jerky in his mouth. The floor was cold as he sat upon it, but not as cold as it was on the surface. Wandering down here through the stone tunnels he hadn’t seen a single room with something he could sleep on. It wasn’t surprising seeing as how old the place was. Most of the furniture had probably rotted away. Rubbing his eyes with his palms he ran one hand down over the salt and pepper stubble on his face and rubbed that section vigorously as well. From where he sat the blue aura of Vulgaris’ Well lit the hall through an arched doorway. Anias debated getting out his bed roll, ground cover, and just sleeping right there. The only problem would be the nagging vibration coming from the Well in the next room. It would either be one of those things that helped put him to sleep or would keep him from getting any at all. Finishing his small meal, he gathered his legs beneath him and walked off down the hall. Exploring more of the underground complex surrounding the well would help him get further away from the pulsating eddy in the next room.

Note: You know, I have no idea where all of this is going. I started writing this last night and continued by writing the second part today. At the very least I like Anias.

He could not look away. For fifteen years he had trekked across deserts and mountains, dark forests and frozen tundra to find this place. Standing on a stone lip made of granite and mortar, Anias was bathed in light coming from the swirling blue vortex that was the Well of Vulgaris. Power emanated from the well and sent vibrations through his body. The vibrations were powerful enough that they could be felt on the surface of the earth hundreds of feet above. His cloak billowed in the air rushing around the room. So like water was the flowing magic, that he had to resist the urge to reach down and dip his hand in it. It was nothing as benign as water, but raw power, the very fabric of existence. With such had the universe been forged and refined. The well was a focus, and functioned much like a bowl left to collect water after a morning dew. In the same the well could collect the excess of power radiating from the surrounding world. It was pure magic, as the plebeians would call it, though it was nothing so simple nor cliché. For nearly a thousand years had the well been distilling hesh’iash, the stuff of existence, from its surroundings. The well was nearly overflowing. So dangerous it was, and so tempting to tap its unlimited power. Such a thing hadn’t been attempted since before the Last War, and he was not about to walk flippantly into such a dangerous endeavor. The histories hinted at the fate awaiting those who dabbled in the craft of sorcery. Despite his skill, Anias could control magic about as well as a fly could control the wind with its wings. Turning, he left the glow of the room and its temptations behind. More study would be needed. For now, having found the well was enough.

Edited.