Roger Taylor: Farnor

It was terrified.

Yet it did not fly away. Could not fly away. It sensed his touch, but it could not fly away!

It was in his thrall! Bound to and by him as totally as any of the lifeless rocks he had just sent hurtling to their destruction.

Come to me, he willed, drawing the bird towards him.

There was some kind of resistance that he could not identify, then he felt it yield. Wings fluttered and the balance shifted again. Come to me. He set forth his power more urgently.

Then, abruptly, there was nothing.

He held his breath. What had happened?

His eyes narrowed as he realized that the frantic tattoo of the tiny heart had stopped. Startled, he let his control slip.

The faint sound of something falling through the leaves in the trees nearby reached him, but Rannick would not have heard the roar of an avalanche, so loud was the exultation ringing in his head.

Throughout his life, following the voice beyond his grandfather’s, Rannick had applied himself to the development of his gift with an assiduity that would have made him a master of any craft had he studied it with the same intensity. Hitherto his progress had been marked by the movement of increasingly large objects at increasingly greater distances. Exhaustion had been the price paid for each use of the power, but even had this not begun to diminish with practice he would have tolerated it for the exhilaration that the use of the power gave him.

But now his progress had taken an entirely unex-pected leap forward. He had touched a living creature. Touched it from within. Controlled it. Killed it!

For a long time, Rannick sat leaning against the rock, breathing heavily, his mind incoherent with the welter of feelings and ideas and schemes that were cascading through it. The rational part of him knew that he must retreat and rest; think. Above all he must think. The destiny that but minutes before had been quite certain, yet infinitely beyond him, was flittering tantalizingly amid this chaos. He had but to grasp it.

The turmoil, however, showed little inclination to diminish. With an effort he forced himself to stand up and to walk. It was no easy task; he was trembling from head to foot.

He shook his head in an attempt to clear it, but to no avail. The excitement burning through him seemed to be drawing its energy from some unquenchable source.

He must try again. Try immediately. Try to reach some other living creature. Learn. Learn now, while the power was so alive in him. He must not let this slip away.

He lurched forward in the direction of the nearby trees. Pebbles and stones jumped and bounced out of his path as he neared them, branches rustled away from him as if he were the heart of a great wind.

Though aware of this turmoil, Rannick ignored it, letting his power flit to and fro indiscriminately. He felt a myriad tiny scrabblings and burrowings, panic-stricken, terrified. Insects, worms, ants, all the inconse-quential creatures of the woodland, he divined. But nothing larger. And yet there must be birds about, perhaps squirrels, even a fox…

He stopped and forced himself to become calmer.

The uproar in his mind silenced, the sounds around him began to impinge again. He leaned forward, listening carefully. Beneath the ceaseless rustle of the trees he began to detect other noises, though they were diminishing rapidly. There were cries and squeals, and the crackling of undergrowth being hastily swept aside and trodden underfoot.

They were fleeing! All those creatures that could do so were fleeing from him. Running from him as if he were a summer fire.

He smacked the edge of his clenched fist against a tree in both frustration and elation. The rough bark grazed his hand but he did not notice. They knew what he could do. The simple creatures of the forest knew . They needed no painstaking reasoning and explanation. No demonstrations. They did not have to struggle with disbelief. They had confirmed his new-found skill with their flight as effectively as if they had remained there to be hurled to and fro like the rocks themselves.

It was good.

Then his hand throbbed. He looked at it. The skin had been broken and peeled back slightly. Absently, he raised his hand to his mouth, bit off the torn skin and sucked the small, bleeding wound clean.

It was good, he thought again as he spat out the dead skin.

Good …

The sensation resonated in his mind as if it had echoed and re-echoed from some towering cliff face, and his mouth suddenly became alive with the taste of blood; bitter… warm…

Good …

For a moment terror flooded through him. As surely as he knew his own power when it reached out and touched things, so he knew now that that same power was reaching out and touching him.

The realization transformed his terror on the in-stant. No! His whole being cried out in rage. Grasses and bushes bowed flat before him and the branches of the trees around him swayed frantically. Somewhere, stones rattled. This could not be. This would not be. This was his gift, his power. He would share it with no one and he would destroy anyone who sought to use it against him.

He would destroy anyone who even possessed it.

The strange touch, however, was gone. Seemingly vanished at the instant of his furious inner cry.

Watchful, Rannick waited.

Slowly he sensed a faint shadow of the presence returning hesitantly. It was almost as if it were reluctant to depart.

Rannick gathered himself for a berserker onslaught to expunge this lingering remnant. The touch slithered away from his rage again. But it did not flee utterly. Rannick hesitated, curious now. He closed his eyes and covered his ears to shut out the sights and sounds around him so that he could better feel this strange presence that was both within and without him.

He sank to the ground, unwittingly increasing his isolation from his surroundings by crouching low and drawing his arms up over his head.

Cautiously he reached out. The presence moved away, wary, nervous. Yet Rannick sensed great strength in it; and its power was both the same and different from his own. It was more whole, more balanced, more assured. But it was also more feral, savage, unfettered.

It was an animal, he realized. A powerful, predatory, animal. Rannick’s curiosity grew. What kind of an animal could it be, and how could it have his power?

And why did it stay with him like this? What did it want?

Then amid the nervousness he began to sense some-thing else. It was familiar, but it eluded him for a moment. Only gradually did he recognize it as subservi-ence.

And need!

The presence lingered because it needed him in some way!

No sooner had he reached this conclusion than the character of the presence seemed to change. A pro-found, black sense of loneliness – eternal loneliness – passed over him. But for all that, it evoked no sympathy, for it was riddled through with a dreadful malice, a malice that Rannick found drawing a like response from somewhere deep within himself.

Whatever this creature was, it was a kindred spirit.

And it needed him.

A small part of him whispered tentatively, Why? but the question died almost before it could be formed. Deeper forces within Rannick were guiding him now. Forces that knew that this creature could serve their needs.

Yet Rannick knew that it was a fearful thing. Could it not in its turn become the master instead of the servant?

It was the last lingering doubt.

No. He had never encountered an animal that he could not master if need arose, with whip or with will. And this one had already accepted him as its superior. Powerful and savage this creature might be, but it would be his to command.

A malevolent glee swept over him as the presence began to fawn on him.