Being born the daughter of a famous king and the student of the greatest witch to ever live, it could be said Medea was born to power, wealth and fame.
All that any person could want from living off the coast of Maláka in the archipelago of Chrysanthe, oft forgotten by those of the mainlands causing diminishing trade over the past decade, but because of who she was any of those who still came to the islands sought to impress and otherwise woo her.
Medea hated her position, no matter how much time had passed people who arrived on her fathers island wasted their time to praise her for merely existing, for being the daughter of a great man and the student of the greatest mage…
The woman felt a dissonance with who she was with the world around her, taking her eyes from the reflection of her person and turning them to the breeze that gently brushed her curtains about as she walked towards them Medea looked out over the balcony of her room in the palace.
The gorgeous blue skies of Caelus stretching on for aeons, the white sand beaches wrapping around the island, the wonderfully light coloured waters of the sea lapping against the coastline.
Then there was the sound of it all, a beautiful orchestra of nature.
She loved her home, she really did.
But there was more to life than wasting away like a flower in the summer heat.
Ever since her aunt's lessons on magic and the world took ahold of her imagination she had wanted nothing more than to see that world beyond the horizon.
However she was beholden to the court of her father as a witch of great standing, her presence kept those stupid enough to push aggressive behaviours in line as well as offering advice on matters she had learned about from her education.
She watched the distant shadow of wispy light clouds slowly approach the island wondering what they might bring with them, her mother, before her passing, was flush with knowledge of spirits and faeries. One such being the Nymphs of the sea- Nereids who could travel the waters by the shadow of clouds such as the one Medea spied.
“Oi! Stop right there!” A voice shouted below drawing the witches attention.
What she found was a group of four palace guards chasing a lightly dressed man wearing a sword through the main courtyard with a large strongbox under his arm.
‘It's far too hot for robbery today, surely?’ she asked herself, watching the event with a raised brow.
Like most days in the archipelago it was intensely hot and bright, the cost of living on what her Aunt had called Solas’ band, a part of Terra which experiences great swells of hot weather and strong ocean winds.
The thief was tackled by a guardsman, brought to his knees before being beaten by the guards armoured fists. While he was beaten by the guard the other three shot over to the strongbox that had split upon hitting the ground throwing the contents of gleaming jewels, necklaces and bangles across the stone of the ground.
For a moment she thought she recognised the thief as one of the servants but dismissed her care for the matter and turned away from the scene, she had better things to do with her time than speculate reasons for theft. Walking back into the room she didn’t have a moment more to herself before a knock on the large wooden door drew her attention-
“Come in Iulia.” She called to her maid.
Almost the moment she’d finished speaking the maid entered the room carrying a black wood box with glyphs engraved on the front, sides and lid. The maid was dressed in her usual attire of soft blue coloured chiton with bronze clasps and her golden hair down over her shoulders, bright warm green eyes greeted the witch with a smile.
“Mistress, a package arrived earlier addressed to you from Lady Pasiphae.” The maid lowered her head as she offered the box to the Witch.
Taking it in her hands Medea noticed the glyphs spark to life reacting to her touch, without much more warning than that the box opened itself revealing a beautiful deep purple silk interior with an envelope sitting on the bottom.
“Hmm” The woman hummed, commenting “My Aunt certainly hasn’t changed her taste since I last saw her.”
Putting the box down she removed the envelope and pulled the letter out of it to read.
“To my dearest Appren-” without warning the Witch of Chrysanthe disappeared into thin air right before her attendants eyes.
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“-tice…” Medea’s voice trailed off as she looked around where she had been sent.
It wasn’t an uncommon tactic of her Aunt to reverse summon her, so when her surroundings changed from her room in the palace to the white sandy beach of Ichorus where the aquamarine waves lapped the shore and she could make out a pride of lions further up the beach on an outcropping of bleached boulders.
There were many wild animals on the isle of Ichorus, all came from Medea’s aunt, the woman was a master of many magics most notably for those who spread rumours of her island were the spells that turned any man into beasts. Though the rumours were twisted into saying the woman was a maniac who viciously cursed those who got on the wrong side of her, in reality the woman only cast such things on those who came to her island to attack her.
Due to the island's overall small size it wasn’t long before Medea found herself outside the clay walled home of the Witch of Ichorus.
She had barely opened her mouth to call out when the front door of the home flew open-
“Medea!” A short auburn haired woman with suntanned bronze skin and bright emerald green eyes threw herself out from the building.
Catching the short woman in her arms unintentionally as the energetic magician hugged her apprentice.
“Good Day Aunt, I hope there was a good reason for you kidnapping me this time?” Medea asked with a half lidded expression.
“I have! Come with me!” The auburn haired witch dropped back to the ground, grabbed the taller woman's hand and dragged her into the home. “Look!Look!Look! Isn’t he adorable!”
Looking to where her aunt had pointed Medea arched a brow turning back to the other woman “Pasiphae you didn’t summon me just to show off that you finally gave birth did you?” She asked.
The woman in question pouted looking like a child in the process as she complained “What?! You don’t like Asterius?!”
“You named him after Asteria?” Medea didn’t bother responding to what her aunt had said.
“Yes!” Pasiphae answered beaming proudly as she reached into a cot and pulled the bovine featured child into her arms. “Isn’t he the cutest! He’s got my face and his fathers eyes!”
The Witch of Chrysanthe breathed a vexed sigh as she rubbed her temples before looking at the child in question. Her nephew was like many half-Minotaurs being mostly human with the bovine features restricted to horns and furred legs with hooves. His skin was a soft caramel colour with bright lava-like red eyes on black sclera.
“He’s certainly cute enough” She replied as the baby reached out a chubby hand to grasp at her. “Why Asterius?” she couldn’t help but ask.
“Old Asta was worried I couldn’t conceive children and offered to help…” A warm precious smile took hold of Pasiphae’s face as her words trailed off.
For as long as Medea could remember her aunt had been trying for a child or children but with no success, so she could at least understand this time why her aunt had gone out of her way to bring her here to see the boy. But it didn’t change the fact that she would need to travel home to the palace manually by boat instead of magic, which was a two day journey.
“A-anyway! I’m forgetting myself~!” Medea might have gotten whiplash from the tonal shift in the other woman's demeanour as she went back to being bright and cheery if not for the years she spent living with her. “The other thing I brought you here for is in my workshop!”
While holding her son in hand the older witch led Medea further into the home to a library that smelt of ink, fresh parchment, and an indescribable thickness to the air that came with heavy magic use where the ambient mana coalesced and became so dense it was palpable.
In other words the room was a wrongly worded incantation away from flattening the island.
“Here we are! You were always talking about wanting to go out and see the world right?” The auburn haired mother asked, receiving a nod she continued. “Well~ Have I got the quest for you!”
“Quest?” Medea questioned, ignoring the rest of what the other woman said.
“You know? Like in the old stories? Anyway I got sent a letter requesting my help with some magic nonsense- but I thought you would want to go instead!” Pasiphae presented the ornately decorated envelope with a broken golden wax seal.
“Dear Lady Pasiphae, I would cordially like to invite you to-” Once again before the Witch of Chrysanthe could finish her sentence she was whisked away by magic to some far flung part of the neighbouring continent.
Satisfied with herself, Pasiphae made noises for her son making the baby giggle away happily as she left the workshop.
‘Good now she can’t say she has a wedding coming up as an excuse.’ She thought as she closed the door.
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This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Medea cursed her aunt as her surroundings warped and changed into that of a large concrete palace with marble pillars and gold decorations wrapping it, then below where she appeared was a somewhat lavishly dressed town, its wealth apparent in wonderfully rare pigments enriching rooftops she could see. Many of the homes were a white brick with deep azure coloured tiles on their roofs with other wooden buildings sporting vermillion tiled roofs.
She was at the top of a staircase that led to the palace's main entrance where a large marble gateway wrapped in several bands of gold and depicted purple wolves between the bands. In front of that were several guardsmen dressed in sleek polished iron armour that glimmered in under the shine of Sol above in the comparatively darker sky to that of her home.
Having never left the archipelago she called home the Witch made little sign of moving more than her confused gawking, this was abruptly cut short when one of the guardsmen approached her, she noted he wore a purple tabard over his armour with a gold embroidered wolf head onto the chest of the fabric.
“Lady Pasiphae?” The man asked in an unsure tone.
Medea breathed a long sigh before responding to the man.
“I am Medea of Chrysanthe, the apprentice of Pasiphae. She sent me in her stead.” The Witch answered and the man nodded accepting her word, likely because she suddenly appeared from nothing and there were few in the continent who could do so and even less were contactable in the way her master was.
“If you will follow me then Lady Witch.” The man motioned for her to follow him down the stairs toward the town.
She wondered what kind of ruler wanted to meet her in their town rather than a meeting room in the palace? Well, literally she knew that her father was happy to break away from the palace any chance he got to hang out with their people, but all she’d learned of the other rulers in the world was that they were distant from their people and often treated them more as a resource than as brothers and sisters.
“My master didn’t tell me much of what your king wanted, could you give me an idea of what I’ll be doing?” She asked the man walking just behind him.
The man nodded his head all the while keeping his eyes forward.
“You’ll see when we get into town…” His voice trailed off before he turned to her and continued, his deep green eyes seemed hollow. “I think I should warn you Lady Witch that… that His lordship is… he is a man of many tastes and he is likely to try force himself on you”
“Oh” The sound of realisation left her mouth before she’d actually even comprehended what he said.
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It was dark in the space where he sat, his eyes blinked slowly and with great effort as he looked up at the creaking sound of a wooden latch being opened-
“Ugh” He complained covering his eyes with his left forearm as bright sunlight slammed into his retina, a bark of laughter almost immediately deafened by the sound of jeering people that suffocated him as he barely had time to get used to all the light.
Flung up into the air from a platform in the hole he landed crudely on his knees and elbows hitting sand over compacted dirt with a wince, feeling the sting of his eyes and as his arm was ripped away from covering his eyes with a rough grunt from the man who had laughed and kicked him out of his cell. After a minute his eyes adjusted and he saw his hell again.
An enormous stadium of adobe with featureless five metre tall walls that kept him from simply climbing out into the ten layer tall seating stands with huge red and reddish-brown cloth that was stretched out over most of the stands to block spectators from the beating of the boiling summer sun. in the stands were thousands of seething fans in varying degrees of dress denoting their status with wealthy nobles in full colourful robes and plebeians wearing a single piece of cloth in the form of tunics or chiton.
The crowd cheered with a thunderous roar like a dragons as a man standing on an outcropping called the fight-
“Borne in the deepest recesses of Kur, raised by the very hand of death itself- Gaiseric!” The voice shouted, directing attention toward him causing him to sigh as he picked himself up and sorted out what his equipment was for this fight.
He couldn’t even remember his real name, at some point he’d started being called Gaiseric after some king who the people of the stands hated with all the vitriol a person possibly could. The voices stopped cheering to spew their disgust and hate his direction for almost a full two minutes before his opponent was announced.
“Now! We have a special bout for you today people of Lagash! Today’s match is one of few and far between! A match to the death!” Another joyous if not monstrous roar of excitement punctuated the announcers statement.
“And fighting our detestable Gaiseric is the Prince of Destruction and Carnage himself! Raizel” His opponent's name was more like an incantation than anything else.
Breathing a long sigh of resignation he looked across the arena to where a huge red skinned monster with pitch black horns growing out of their long mane of stark white hair, glowing blue eyes glared his direction as his own eyes looked the opponent up and down. He realised whatever it was, it was female with a clear femininity to its face and body with large mounds barely hidden under dirty cloth and wide hips and thick muscular legs mostly covered by a leather skirt with metal plates down its hips.
In a just as muscular pair of arms was an enormous wooden maul with metal spikes sticking out of the end with the weapon over the monster's shoulder. Gaiseric wondered what the woman was as he sighed again and did a few stretches with a mangled wooden shield in hand and a spear in the other.
The crowds settled as the announcer called the rules of the battle which he’d heard a thousand times, ignoring it he rolled his shoulders and lowered in a near crouch stance with his arms wide as the red skinned beast across from him snarled and put a hand forward with her weapon hand reaching back ready for a hefty swing.
“The fight starts… Now!” Almost the moment the announcer finished the word the two fighters shot off toward each other with a roar of the crowd.
Thundering footfalls followed the giant red skinned woman as she sprinted forth, Gaiseric felt his mind still and his body move instinctually as he shot forward in a dash feigning a thrust forward with his spear and throwing his shield as hard as he could at the other combatant. Sadly his opponent wasn’t like the average drivel they threw him against, normally the surprise of the shield shooting toward them a good distraction for long enough that he could get in a proper first strike. But here it failed as the woman smashed through it with her left hand that she still held in front of her.
As the pair reached short of ten feet of each other the giant swung her weapon over and down while Gaiseric shifted easily to the side thrusting upward narrowly missing the jaw of the woman as the sharp edge of his weapon caused a small cut across her face.
Ripping his spear back he skipped back several feet out of the way as the maul sailed over his head whistling as it cut through the air before switching directions on a dime and came crashing down on him-
“GRH!” A frustrated noise growled out of Raizel as her whole arm tensed pulsing with power as she attempted to crush him into paste.
Breathing a long and slowly Gaiseric held his position with a somewhat strained expression as his left hand gripped the much larger woman's tree trunk like wrist, the pair shared a look before Gaiseric’s face twitched, betraying his next move. He kicked out at the knee of Raizel as he moved to the side letting her weapon smash into the ground tearing up the sand and dirt sending chunks flying briefly blocking the giants view as the spear head shot under her ribs piercing flesh deep blue blood spraying out of the wound as he snapped the head off inside and quickly rushing away to reset his stance.
Standing with what was now a two metre long staff with the broken off spearhead Gaiseric felt things could be going better for him, but he’d made due with less.
Raizel roared something in a language he couldn’t understand as she ripped the metal piercing her and threw it aside before gripping her weapon with both hands and closing the distance in a matter of seconds as her weapon swatted toward him
Crap
Was all Gaiseric managed to think before pain wracked his body when the woman’s weapon struck his left arm breaking it instantly as he was sent skidding across the sand with a roar from the crowds.
Stumbling to his feet with a limp arm he barely dodged the follow up attack that left a crater where he’d been standing moments ago, sliding under the woman he leapt up behind her whipping out a knife from his side and slashing her back before driving it into her back ribs with far more strength than someone of his average stature should have been capable of with enough force to send the red skinned giant stumbling forward.
Recovering quickly the woman had a deep frown as her muscled tensed, a torrent of wind whirled around her blowing out sand into a wall before it sparked and lit on fire a cyclone of fiery whisps dancing around her before Raizel rushed forward with a yell raising her weapon over her head.
Magic like the red skinned woman’s wasn’t the craziest thing he’d been subject to and wasn’t too bothered by the wave of heat that crashed into him, it shredded his clothing though revealing his form to the crowd as the tattered rags he wore went up in a blaze as he threw it away in time to skid to the right out of the way of her attack.
Beneath the rags he wore was a tattered crop top's worth of chainmail, a single pauldron and greaves though the rest of his flesh was exposed with nothing but a loincloth to keep his modesty. His body was a battlefield of wear with hundreds of scars marring it and most poignantly a relatively recently healed hole in through his midsection on the front and back.
Gaiseric was a pale, golden haired man, with his right eye an amber and his left a bright red, his musculature was fairly well defined with little fat on him from his years of slavery to the blood sport of his owners.
The revelation of his appearance sent the crowd into a gasp before silence drowned the arena with even his opponent stopping them in their tracks with wide eyes.
“Stilicho?” For the first time since the fight started the woman sounded sentient as her magic wound down and halted completely as she stared.
The red skinned giant stepped forward with a clear desperation in her tone and eyes.
A confused scowl crossed the blonde man’s face as he tried to figure out what kind of trap the woman was laying, he took a step back wincing as his adrenaline petered off and the pain of his mangled arm.