Chapter 11

“Everyone quiet!” Sigrun thundered.

The room fell silent. She marched over to where Tythos stood.

“What did you do to him?” She asked.

“I warned him,” Tythos said.

“Where did he go?”

“My pet creature ate him. I just got finished saying I told the truth, didn’t I?”

“Bring him back!”

“What if I can’t?”

Sigrun narrowed her eyes at him, “Then I’m going to make your life very difficult.”

“I told you to put him on a leash.”

“I thought you were going to hit him or something.”

“That was tempting, but if I did that, I would probably kill him. I’m not so good at restraint.”

Sigrun loomed over Tythos and glowered at him.

“Is he gone?”

“Not completely.”

“Then bring him back.”

“Let’s talk about what we’re going to do about the soldiers first.”

“We’re going to do nothing about the soldiers. I’ve got orders.”

“I appreciate your stalwart sense of duty, but you’ve got a problem.”

“And what’s that?”

“I agreed to help you for my hand, but I’ve already got it, so I’m more free to interpret what that means than I might otherwise be. All these king’s men are likely to decide to finish the job and kill everyone in this valley because I lived here once. I can’t let that happen. While I’d like to help you, I’ve got to prioritize the lives of these men, women and children over our little errand. So before I’ll be coming with you, I’m going to need to stop them from killing everyone.”

“What about my man, Lancaster?”

Tythos snorted, “Lancaster?”

“Yes! Where does he come into this?”

“Ah, ok, so if you help me save these people and get on our way faster, I’ll give you back Lancaster.”

“Not good enough,” Sigrun said.

“Not good enough? Not good enough? You should be helping me preserve life on the principal that it should be your fucking job anyway!” Tythos glared up into her face.

“Agree to take the deal the commander offers you when we get where we’re going and I’ll help you,” Sigrun said.

Tythos eyed her. “Your status is on the line isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is. That’s beside the point. My orders were to use the hand to secure your cooperation. I messed that up. I still intend to fulfill my orders by any means necessary.”

“Really?” Tythos suppressed a smirk, she looked serious. “Ok, I’ll tell you what the commander is going to want. He’s going to want me to go back. To enter the dream world and go speak with the things that live there. Probably kill someone while I’m at it. It’s a suicide mission.”

“Fine,” Sigrun said, “If you release my man, and agree to take the deal the commander offers, then I’ll go with you and help you. In the meantime, we’ll help you save the lives of the people in this valley.”

“I shouldn’t have to be making deals to get help to save people. You’d seriously come with me to the dream world?”

“You have my word.”

Tythos looked into her eyes, then after a long moment nodded. “Very well, as long as the commander’s deal is not comply untenable, I accept.”

Tythos turned to the nightmare, who was squatting in the corner of the room with a big smile on its face.

“Alright,” he said, “spit him out.”

The smile turned into a frown, “But you said I could eat him.”

“Who are you talking to?” Sigrun asked.

Tythos ignored her.

“I got talked out of it this time, but we’ll leave it on the table for the future. Now spit him out.”

“Can’t I just keep him overnight? He’s terrified. It’s delicious.”

“No. You can’t keep him overnight, we’re not sleeping. We got work to do and every man will count. Now spit him out.”

“Fine.”

***

Sigrun stared at the man in front of her as he began to argue with an empty corner of the room. She tried asking who he was talking to, but he ignored her. The attitude the man had, made figuring out what he was being serious about difficult. Sigrun wasn’t sure what to do with him.

The stories she’s heard about him during the war had been horrific. The man butchered whole villages, he ate the dead, he had a demon that did his bidding, he could use magic, and these were the more plausible things she had heard. Sigrun liked to think through problems. Really sit and chew on something before deciding what she believed about a thing. So when she was young, she’d thought about the problem that was advancing across the country, a hoard of barbarians at his back. She’d thought about Tythos Tyrannous Rex.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

It had been her conclusion that almost every rumor could be chalked up to the man’s ability to use magic. At the time of his invasion, this had been the most unbelievable thing about him. Magic from the people of the north was rumor, ledgend, myth, or taken another way, foolish superstition. Only the gods gave magic, and the north men had no gods.

The rumors surrounding his ability to use magic were too persistent. They came from too many people that she had trouble dismissing. When Tythos’s armies had arrived at the capital, she’d seen for herself.

Tythos seemed to win the argument he was having. Sigrun caught a glimpse of a dark figure standing in the corner of the room, before it opened up, splitting wide, and Lance appeared. Rather, he fell out of the hole the dark figure had just split to reveal. He tumbled onto the floor in a heap, screaming. He flailed about himself, as if trying to ward off an unseen attacker, or a swarm of wasps. Sigrun looked back up for the dark figure, but it was gone. The corner of the room was once again empty.

Sigrun began to head toward Lance, but Bird put a hand on her arm.

“Let me handle this,” he said.

He walked over to where Lance was still in a state of panic and brought something out of the satchel he carried. He crushed it and held it over Lance’s nose, who stiffened, then relaxed.

“Ok,” Bird said, “Come over here and give me a hand.”

Sigrun helped him move Lance over near the fire. Bird said he’d sleep for a time, then wake up more naturally.

Sigrun leaned close to Bird an spoke low, “What’s wrong with him?”

“The man’s in a state of panic,” Bird said. “Looking at him, I can’t see that he’s injured in any way, but I won’t know for sure until he wakes up.”

“How long will he sleep?”

“Not long. Hour, maybe two.”

“You ever seen anything like that?”

“Nope.”

“I fucking hate magic,” Sigrun said, scowling.

Bird raised his eyebrows at her. She returned the look.

“What?” She said.

Bird shook his head, “I know the feeling. Black swords, green towers of fire, and now men being swallowed up by nothing.”

It was Sigrun’s turn to shake her head, “It wasn’t nothing. I mean, I don’t think it was. Right before Lance appeared, I thought I saw some… something.”

“The man did say he had a pet creature,” Bird said. “Do you think it’s true, what they said in the war— that he consorted with demons?”

Sigrun looked over at Tythos, who was rummaging through the farm house’s pantry. He was stuffing food into a sack and had stuffed some into his mouth.

“I don’t know,” she said.

Sigrun and Bird both watched the man ransack the house. He seemed very upset that the people who lived here had been killed, but had no compunction about going through their things. Sigrun’s thoughts drifted to the beginning of this journey. Back to when she’d been informed that she would be escorting Tythos across the kingdom. She’d been assigned this group of people to do it with, instead of her unit. She’d also found out that the king had people who could use magic. It was a well kept secret. She’d been assigned one of them and sent on her way.

Peony had called himself a thaumaturge. This meant nothing to Sigrun. He had proceeded to try and explain it, but none of the ideas he presented made any sense. He could light things on fire by singing a strange language while he touched them, and implied he could do other things, but Sigrun doubted he actually could. The only thing she’d seen him do was light fires. He also acted like this was his first time out of the capital.

“Alright kid,” Tythos said as he strode across the room. He headed for Peony, who looked cornered. He looked around the room as if asking for help. “Let’s have a talk about what you can do with your new magic.”

***

Tythos kicked a chair over and sat down in front of the kid. He tried to remember the kid’s name, but all he recalled was that it’d sounded like a girl’s name to him. The kid looked like he was too young to be shaving, let alone traipsing around with a bunch of soldiers. He glanced at the short woman, who also looked young, to see if she was his minder, but she still looked wryly amused. Not the boy’s minder then. Tythos decided to try and open with something that would engage the boy, instead of locking him up.

“Balefire, is what it’s called,” Tythos said.

“Balefire?” The kid looked interested despite his fear, and leaned forward.

“Yeah, you asked what that green fire was. I used too much of it.”

“I…” the kid swallowed, “I heard your invocation, and it didn’t make any sense. I mean— burn baby burn? There’s no structure in the words. I’ve been thinking about it. If I hadn’t seen it work, I wouldn’t believe it. Also, it didn’t sound like you were on key.”

“There’s nothing wrong with the words,” said the nightmare. “It’s better than abracadabra, or alakazam. I didn’t choose silly nonsense for my magic words.”

“Structure?” Tythos asked. All Tythos knew about magic he’d learned from the nightmare and a book he’d found in the dream world. He no longer had the book.

“Sure,” the kid’s eyes lit up, “Structure is the most basic principal underlying the use of all magic. Magic is all around us, you see.” He waved a hand through the air to illustrate.

Tythos glanced at spot the kid was waving his hand through. It looked like any other bit of air to him. The kid was warming to the subject and went on in an excited tone before Tythos could comment,

“But in order for the magic to manifest, you have to build a structure, one that matches the magic you’re trying to use, so that the magic can go from where it is,” he waved his hand through the air again, “to where you want the magic to be.” The kid brought his hands together.

Tythos beetled his brow, none of that sounded like anything he knew of.

“From where it is?” Tythos asked.

The nightmare began to laugh.

The kid grinned, “Yeah, where it is. Current popular thought is that magic is on another plane of existence, one that we can’t touch or interact with, unless the right structure bridges the gap.”

The nightmare was still hooting with laughter, Tythos turned to it.

“You’re making it really damn hard to listen to hot-shot here,” the kid opened his mouth, a confused look on his face, but Tythos held up his hand to forestall him. “Mind telling me what it is you find so damn funny?”

The kid was giving Tythos a worried look. Tythos held up a finger. The laughter of the creature wound down enough that it was able to talk.

“What’s funny is how wrong that explanation is,” the creature said, still chuckling.

“Care to explain?” Tythos said.

“I lack the words,” the nightmare frowned, “How do you explain a quantum-processor when the radio hasn’t been invented yet?”

“What’s a radio?” Tythos asked.

“Exactly.”

“You mind making a point or just fuck off?”

“Rude. I’m enjoying hearing how wrong he is. It’s amusing.”

Tythos sighed. “Alright, if he’s that wrong, they how come what he does is working?”

“Well,” the nightmare grinned, “a man can still light a fire with flint and steel, even if he believes the sparks represent the flint’s sexual climax, and the fire its offspring.”

“You’re disgusting.”

“You asked.”

“My question had nothing to do with the sexual activity of rocks!”

Everyone in the room stopped what they were doing and looked at Tythos. He growled in annoyance and lowered his voice.

“I’ve got to remember my rule not to ask you questions. I always regret it.”

“That’s just rude,” the creature blew a raspberry and stalked toward the door. “I need to eat.”

“You’re kidding. How many times have you already eaten today?”

“How many things have I done? Manifesting and interacting with things takes energy. Let me have the bodies in the yard.”

“Fine,” Tythos said, “But we’re going to bury the bones of the farmers when shit calms down.”

“You know, if you deepened our bond, you’d understand some of the things I do.”

“That’s a sound argument against ever doing it.”

“Rude.” The Nightmare slipped through the gaps around the wooden door, sliding through like water until it was gone.

Tythos looked back at the kid in front of him, who had a worried look on his face.

“How many sigils do you know?”

The kid’s brow creased in confusion, “Sigils?”

“Yeah, like how I called balefire. Your magic structure idea kinda fits with what I know. I draw a very precise structure and then channel magic through it. If I’ve drawn it correctly, it produces the effect I desire.”

“You channel magic?”

“Of course,” Tythos said, “Wait, you don’t know how to channel magic?”

“I don’t even know what you’re talking about,” the kid said.

“You’re telling me that if I drew a sigil for you here, right now, you wouldn’t be able to activate it?”

“I don’t know. I have no idea. I mean, we could try. I’ve never heard of sigils or channeling magic.”

“Then where did the power come from when you showed me that trick with the stick and the fire?”

“Oh that? The power all comes from the other place, like I was telling you.”

The Nightmare began laughing again.

“Goddamnit,” Tythos muttered.

***