Michael

A fairytale, a dream, an illusion, or a hard reality? Michael couldn’t discern which of them this world and the little hut were. Right at this moment it didn’t even matter all that much.

The hut was a small thing maybe five by five meters with a window that he couldn’t see through, a closed door, and a chimney that spewed a thin stream of smoke into the air. It had a certain dichotomy of being inviting and screaming danger at him.

Michael stepped closer with his hand on the grip of his sword and raised his other to knock but the door swung open before he had the chance to. Just like with the window, he could only see blackness past the threshold which even his augmented eyes couldn’t piece.

He swallowed hard; his body was urging him to turn around but something else was inviting him from inside of the hut. Before he could think about it clearly his legs were already stepping into the hut with the door closing with a quiet squeak behind him.

Warm light surrounded Michael as if he had stepped into another world. The hut seemed much bigger on the inside than it had from the outside but was still a modest size if compared with what hunting lodges of nobility looked like.

The difference with them was that this one looked much more like an herbalist's home than a hunter's. There was a fire bustling in the fireplace with a cauldron above it, different herbs were hanging from the walls all around, and Michael could identify multiple alchemical and magical instruments.

All this would have caught his attention if it weren’t for the old woman with silvery skin and white hair sitting at a wooden table, her black eyes focused directly on his.

“Welcome,” she said, her voice seemingly coming from everywhere but her mouth.

His hand gripped his sword even tighter as he spoke, “Thank you but where am I?”

“You are at my home,” she replied matter-of-factly.

“That is not what I mean, and I think you know this.”

“What is it that you mean?” A smile played around the old woman’s eyes as she toyed with him.

“This world. This forest. This hut. Is all of it an illusion, another realm, or a mana refuge? It can’t be real,” Michael explained himself even if he was sure the woman was just having fun with him.

“Real or not real, is there really such a thing? Does a spider’s web exist before it catches the fly or is it the fly’s fear that makes it real? What is real really?”

That made little sense, Michael thought, he had spent a lot of his time with Solon discussing philosophy, but he never liked the parts of it that delved into completely impractical subjects.

“Real or not real, I would very much like to leave and return to my people. Can you tell me the way out,” he asked without moving away from his spot in front of the door.

“I certainly can,” she answered shortly.

Michael waited but she didn’t continue. He knew what she was doing, she was playing with words.

“I have no time for this,” he said while rolling his eyes and turned around to leave.

She huffed behind him and complained loudly, “The lack of patience must lay in the family. Just like your uncle.”

Michael stopped his hand before it reached the door and slowly turned back to the woman with silvery skin.

“You know my uncle?” he asked but it dawned on him before she could say more. His eyes widened and a clump started to form in his stomach “You are the shaman that he spoke about, the one that told him of the future.”

“Shaman, hag, witch, mage, monster, savior. So many names and one more false than the previous and at the same time they all fit. You may call me Nayk,” the hag replied, and her laugh echoed from all sides, a chittering noise accompanying it that Michael couldn’t place but he didn’t have the head to care either.

“Why have you brought me here?” Michael asked weakly.

“Because fate has decreed for you to be here. I have something that I am supposed to show you, so take a seat, young Lord Michael Rowan.” Nayk pointed at a chair on the other side of the table she was sitting at, her movements awkward which could probably be accounted to her obviously high age.

“What do you want to show me?” Michael asked, his voice nearly a whisper as he stepped forward slowly and sat down. Between them was a bowl of water, large enough to serve as a bowl at a royal feast.

“The worst day of your life,” Nayk said and gently swung her hand over the bowl causing color to appear in the water. Michael stared at it, unable to pull away from what he was seeing.

- On a fateful night –

Wounded and surrounded stood Lord Cedric Rowan in the darkness. Nine men lay in the dirt already but three dozen more surrounded him. In normal circumstances, he wouldn’t doubt his chances, but he could feel the paralytic poison from the knife wound running through his body. He had been betrayed, stabbed in the back by someone he trusted, believed to be on his side.

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The poison wasn’t the only reason why this fight was unwinnable though, his mana held the effects back as well as possible so even with some augmenters and mages in the enemy ranks, if one could call these thugs that, he would stand a chance. He wasn’t alone, he couldn’t just rage and try to recklessly reduce their numbers, he had to protect Mylia.

She stood behind him, holding a sword and covering his back. She never was a great fighter, but he had taught her how to defend herself and against some common thug it would be enough but even if his assailants were thugs, common wasn’t the word for them.

Even with them being outnumbered, him poisoned, and having to protect her he might have been able to get her out of this at least, if it weren’t for that archer.

Normal arrows couldn’t hope to do any significant damage to an augmenter of Cedric’s caliber, you would need at least a war bow to hurt him in a noticeable manner, but that archer was an augmenter himself with specialized equipment. Cedric could see the smile on the broad face of the man, he had already placed two arrows into the count which made it harder to move.

Cedric sighed, there was no way out of this for them. Right now, the men surrounding them were hesitating, but they wouldn’t wait forever.

“Love,” he said calmly. “I think this is the end of the line.”

Mylia took in a sharp breath; Cedric expected her to panic. He had honestly expected her to panic the whole time, but he could only feel an unshakeable trust from her.

“Well, I always knew that you would die in a blaze of glory, never thought that for myself though,” her voice shook as she fought to stay brave.

Cedric gritted his teeth and looked around as he had done a dozen times since this fight started already for something he had missed, an opening he could create for her.

The children can’t lose both of us, at least one must survive, he pleaded but it was all the same as before. The moment he left her side either the archer or one of the assassins would pick her off and if he stayed then he would be slowly whittled down with magic and arrows until he ran out of mana.

“It is okay, darling,” her voice becoming pained. “Go and take as many of these bastards with you as possible. I will find you in the next life … I promise.”

He turned his head to her just to see her fall with an arrow in her chest, he had not noticed it at all. Cedric’s eyes widened as her lips moved to say her last words but the blood rushing through his ears made him deaf. Mylia Rowan, Lady of the Counties of Reen and Emall and mother of four dropped to her knees with a pained smile and died. It wasn’t glorious, it didn’t have any meaning for the world, it was just death plain and simple.

The assassins had closed in while Cedric was distracted by what had happened, trying to capitalize on the count’s shock. It wasn’t their approach that dragged the count out of his frozen state but a loud laugh from the archer in the back. “You shouldn’t get distracted in the heat of battle, milord.”

Eight men approached Cedric Rowan and tried to strike him down before he regained his composure. A moment later four heads were separated from their respective necks and the lord was gone from the encirclement.

Mana flared brightly as the sun and his muscles began to ache and rip but he didn’t care. The poison ran free in his body, but he didn’t care. He was past the second row of assassins before they even realized with one man losing part of his skull and another having his neck snapped.

Cedric’s target wasn’t these small fries. He could see surprise and fear in the archer’s expression as Cedric suddenly traversed fifteen meters in a moment. His sword soared up, his muscles tense to the point of ripping, just one more step.

At the last step, his body finally gave way to the inhuman treatment Cedric had given it and a muscle in his leg ripped with a loud snap. His sword fell but came up just a centimeter too short, blood flew as the tip of Cedric’s sword ripped a small gash into the archer’s left cheek.

The man jumped back over eight meters with a single vault, but Cedric couldn’t stand anymore, his legs were ruined.

I am sorry my love, my arm was just not long enough, he thought as the paralytic poison began to overcome his resistance now that his mana was nearly spent. His breathing slowed down and his vision became blurry.

“Holy hells man, that was really scary,” the archer said and poked at his wound. “That’s gonna leave a scar. I would say I am gonna kill you for that, but I don’t think that is necessary anymore.”

Cedric raised his head laboriously and looked at the man with a weak smile.

“What are you smiling at, dead man,” the archer asked while frowning.

“Just looking from one dead man to another,” he answered between heavy breaths.

“That’s cute. Who do you think is gonna avenge you? We are currently killing your whole family.”

“You better aim well then, because if even a single one of my children survives this then you will beg that you were never born.”

The archer growled and wanted to reply something, but the life had already left Count Cedric Rowan’s eyes but on his face was a mocking smile.

- Back in the present -

Tears ran down Michael’s face as he stared at his father kneeling in the dirt. The vision began to fade and the color in the bowl returned to an incomprehensible mess.

“Who stabbed him in the back?” Michael asked. “Was it my uncle?”

Nayk waved her hand over the bowl without a word and another scene appeared. Lord Grim riding as if his life depended on it, the sun was coming up in the distance as he cleared a hilltop to see the estate of Viscount Telp with smoke coming up from all over.

“You are lying, you are trying to trick me,” Michael yelled and stood up, his chair falling over from the sudden movement.

Nayk looked at him calmly. “I am not here to convince you of what you have seen, I was meant to show you but what you do with that is your own decision.”

“It can’t be … I-I … what have I done,” Michael stammered while staring at the picture of devastation that was his uncle’s face.

He refocused, his pain and anger leading him back to the first vision. “How was it then? Who betrayed my parents, who is to blame?”

“That is an answer that I cannot give you. I have shown you what I was able to peer from the web of time, the identity of those you ask for remains shrouded to even my vision,” Nayk explained emotionless.

Michael gritted his teeth and grabbed the hilt of his father’s sword. “Look again,” he growled and fixated on the old witch.

Nayk smirked at the threat, “Adorable. Our time here is now over, I have done what I was supposed to, and you need to return to your world.”

“Hold on a minute,” Michael tried to stop her, but she simply flicked her wrist, and Michael was back standing in the normal forest.

I didn’t even feel her doing anything, Michael thought but he couldn’t keep that observation in the forefront of his mind for long. The revelations of this meeting were too heavy for him to bear.

“I need to get back. I need to fix this,” Michael muttered to himself and looked around to find the way. Luckily, his guards were focusing on leaving no tracks when returning to the camp, but that precaution had apparently gone out of the window the moment Michael had vanished, judging by the clear path someone had made.

He took a step forward in that direction, but a noise stopped him. Someone was approaching, maybe a search party?

Michael’s eyes narrowed as Sir Dittrich Plon stepped out of the underbrush and spotted Michael, his expression turning into something sinister.

“Hello there, demon spawn,” the knight said. “It seems that Idas is favoring me today.”