James Galloway - The Tower of Sorcery

"Dar? Why Dar?"

Not everyone is as valuable as he appears, my kitten, she replied. Dar has qualities that you overlook.

"What about the others?"

Others will certainly join you, my kitten, and you should always welcome friends, she told him. But those five I named, their unique skills and attributes will be a very great boon to you.

"What do I do with them?"

Well, you can start by getting yourself to Dala Yar Arak, she said impishly. What you do when you get there is up to you. But it would be best to get there first, wouldn't it?

"I guess," he sighed. He had thrown off one yoke, and had just taken on another. But at least this driver he could tolerate. His faith in the Goddess was the only reason he could allow it. "I'll find your Firestaff, Goddess, and then I'll make sure nobody can get their hands on it. Then I can be free."

You will be free, she promised, and you will be happy. I will make sure of that. But right now, time is wasting, my kitten. You have to go.

He nodded. "What about the tent?"

I will keep watch over it. You never know, you may come back here some day. I'll make sure that the books are here waiting for you if you do.

He felt…ridiculous. Why was he doing this? He had his freedom in his paws, and he was throwing it away. But it would be an empty freedom, a freedom with a dark cloud hanging over it. If someone else found that strange artifact and used it, it could destroy everything. Tarrin could endure being in thrall to the Goddess, mainly because he was one of the few people he would trust. He felt that she did indeed love him, and that working for her would be a mutually respectful relationship. He was nobody to go on some mad quest. He was a village boy who had started with dreams of Knighthood, and now only had dreams of tranquility. But galavanting off on some search for a lost artifact had never crossed his mind.

Standing up, he stared up at the statue. He wondered when he wouldn't feel numb anymore, and how he would feel about this when he didn't. How he would feel about alot of things. He was still operating in a daze of sorts, an unfeeling state of mind that only allowed his grim tasks of payback to be considered. It was a heightened state of unfeeling, and the Cat had alot to do with it. He stared at the statue for a very long moment, her words echoing in his mind, her choice stretching out before him like a road laced with broken glass.

But there really was no other choice. His little mother was depending on him to make her world safe, and it was something that needed to be done. He wouldn't trust an artifact of that kind of power in anyone else's hands. He would find it, and when he found it, he would destroy it.

It would never threaten the world again. Because he could possibly be alive the next time the Firestaff threatened the balance of life on Sennadar.

Bowing his head, he turned and left the statue, slipping back into the dark foliage that concealed the courtyard from the outside world. Where it was bitterly cold that night elsewhere, in the courtyard and the gardens it was warm and pleasant. But a cold wind emanated from the statue, a cold wind that permeated the maze, filtered out into the gardens, creeping through the gardens and giving the flowers and fruit trees and plants an unknown shock. Not enough to kill, but more than enough to make them close up in defense against the chill, protect themselves from that induced cold. The cold did gather around the tent holding the pilfered books and scrolls, coalescing around it like moths to a flame, and then shimmering into a clear dome of the finest crystal. To protect what was within against the rain, to protect the paper against the marching of time's inexorable advance, to defend against fading and having the parchment turn brittle in the dry protection of the dome.

And then the courtyard fell dark, as the light emanating from the statue faded. The expression on the face of that delicate stone maiden was stoic, resolute, like a traveller heading down the road leading home. A long and twisting road, full of bandits and uncertainty, but with something good at the end of it to make the journey worthwhile.

And the tent with its cache of books stood, books not truly read in all the excitement over finding the tutorial for learning the Sha'Kar langauge, books penned a thousand years ago and more, holding lore and information lost to the world. They sat in their dark chests, protected from the marching of time by the Goddess' dome, sheltered from the rain, cradled like children in the arms of a loving mother.

Waiting.

" Tarrin !" Dar protested as the Were-cat dragged him through the streets of Suld on a bitterly cold, crystal-clear night.

The trip back into the Tower was important for more than one reason. Tarrin swung by his room and picked up all his things, since the Council hadn't thought to clean it out yet. His staff was important to him, and he wanted it back. He had it, along with all his traveling leathers-he would never wear Initiate colors again!-and his personal effects. After that, he had picked up Dar, literally, grabbing his personal chest in one paw and Dar in the other, and carrying the blanket-wrapped Arkisian right out of the Tower. He had the sense not to raise a fuss on the grounds, but when Tarrin used his formidable magic to breach the Weave, suffering a horrible backlash for his efforts, Dar found his objections voiced after they were out of the Tower's earshot.

"I lost my blanket and I'm cold !" he protested. "Put me down!"

Tarrin stopped and lightly set him on his feet, looking at him. He was hopping from bare foot to bare foot to protect them against the biting cold of the flagstones, and his teeth were chattering. He was dressed only in a nightshirt, and it wavered with the cold wind and caused his dark skin to prickle with goosebumps.

"I'm sorry," he said calmly, putting down the chest and opening it. "Let's get you dressed."

"What in the world are you doing, Tarrin?" Dar demanded. "You could have just asked me to come with you!"

"I wanted it to look exactly like what it was, Dar," he said calmly. "An abduction. I'm stealing you."

Dar gave him a look, then laughed. "I'm not worth that much, my friend."

"You are to me," he said, handing Dar a pair of wool breeches. Dar literally jumped into them, then stepped into the leather shoes he kept at the bottom of the chest, which Tarrin had removed for him. "I need your help."

"Doing what?"

"I found out what the Tower wanted from me," he said in a neutral voice. "I also heard it from the Goddess herself. I, I have something I have to do. So I'm going on a trip. I need your help, Dar. The Goddess said you know things that are important."

"Me? Why me?"

"I have no idea," he replied honestly. "But I need your help."

"Where are we going?"

"Right now, Yar Arak. From there, I don't know."

" Yar Arak !"

Tarrin nodded. "I'll explain it all when I get back to the chapterhouse with you," he said. "I only want to have to go through it once. Even I don't understand why I'm doing it."

"What are we doing?" Dar said plaintively.

They were all there. Darvon, Ulger, and Azakar sat with Faalken at a table in the chapterhouse's main study, a place for the prefect of the chapterhouse to receive guests. Keritanima and Allia sat on a sofa near the fire with Binter and Sisska standing at its ends in protection of the Princess, and Dolanna and Miranda sat on the sofa flanking it. Dar sat on a chair with his back to the fire, a heavy cloak around him as he warmed himself after his bitterly cold journey through Suld. The study was large and decorated richly to impress guests, with a rug from the East gracing the floor, and shields and banners from Knights of fame and history decorating the walls. A long, rich history of brave men and great warriors were represented on those walls, and it was every Knight's dream to be placed among such august names as Arymin, Luthor, Arthos, Beremos, Haldar, Pargen the Crusader, and the most famous and legendary Knight of them all, Marcus Lightblade. There were others there as well, others that Tarrin needed to talk to. Tomas and Janine had been summoned to the chapterhouse, and they sat uncertainly on a pair of chairs placed for them beside Dar. The only Sorcerer left in the Tower that Tarrin trusted, Sevren, sat on the other side of Dar, wrapped in a thick cloak himself, after just arriving in answer to the summons.