Mystic Pursuit, page 21
While she had always sought to resist using her abilities to control another life, she often found herself keenly aware of what they thought and how they felt. The sense was as much a part of her as seeing the animal or hearing its call. Whether it was hungry, tired, content or in pain, Mawi-naa could sense all of these. In fact, the only beings for which she lacked this ability were mystics and humans, though in her limited interaction with humans, she felt that such extra-sensory gifts were rarely necessary.
The throngs of screaming, laughing human soldiers surrounding her served as abundant evidence of this fact. The humans crowding closest to her forced their arms through the netting to grab hold of her, attempting to push her farther out into the pen. Though she knew it may betray the stupor of compliance she feigned, she simply could not bring herself to move from her spot in front of the column.
However, the commotion drew the attention of the great predator, and it skulked steadily toward her. As it neared, like a distant form coming into focus, Mawi-naa found herself growing aware of its intent. The rock leopard was frightened and confused by the mad frenzy around him. He was in good health, but he was hungry, having traveled with the humans in a cramped cage for many days. He needed desperately to feed.
Mawi-naa stood perfectly still amidst the furious commotion resonating within the courtyard. She stared directly into the mottled yellow eyes of the rock leopard as it looked back at her, assessing its prey. Slowly it drew nearer, its jaw lowered as its panting deepened. It was going to strike, she knew it. But she refused to change its course, not out of fear of being exposed to the vile army around her, but out of respect. And love.
As she stood, awaiting her brutal demise, she knew, for the first time, why she resisted succumbing to the temptation of abusing her gifts. Though she respected her forefathers greatly and sought to honor them and the great Lii-jit culture they envisioned, it was not in their honor that she followed their decree. It was because she felt as strong a bond toward the animal and plant life she lived amongst as she did with any so-called intelligent being. The natural world was so beautifully crafted, so perfect, that to be but a small part of it was a privilege. And to alter that world to suit her own needs and ambitions could only render it less perfect.
Mawi-naa stood, feeling her body relax and grow calm. The boisterous sounds around her evaporated as she stared ever deeper into the eyes of the approaching beast. She did not wish for death, but suffering such a fate through an act of nature would appease her soul infinitely more than simply falling upon the sword of some crude mercenary.
With the rock leopard a mere three strides from her, Mawinaa saw the beast lower its head just above the stone ground and raise its haunches, preparing to strike. She bowed her head and stretched out her arms by her side, awaiting the end.
The rock leopard leapt. Feeling no impact, Mawi-naa looked up to see the great beast soaring over her and over the mesh barrier.
As it descended upon the shocked onlookers, panic erupted. The crowd frantically fought to disperse, at once and in all directions, as the rock leopard took its first victim.
Seeing that all attention had shifted from her, Mawi-naa ran. She ran as fast as she could, darting to the far end of the pen and leaping over the netting. She hit the ground silently and continued running toward the courtyard entrance and the dark, wooded sanctuary beyond it. In her wake, she could hear anguished screams as the starved beast sought to nourish itself. The sound pleased her, though she felt a mild guilt at feeling so.
She approached the threshold to the tower courtyard, the cool outdoor breeze brushing against her face. Taking one final leap toward the dirt path ahead, she was suddenly blinded by a brilliant white light filling the entire space beyond the tower. Disoriented, she fell in a heap upon the ground.
As the darkness of night once again returned to the air around her, Mawi-naa struggled to rise but was unable. Below the waist, her body had grown numb. Hearing the sound of footsteps behind her, she craned her neck to see who approached.
“An interesting ploy, my dear,” said the voice behind her, silhouetted by the glowing torchlight inside the courtyard. When her eyes adjusted, Mawi-naa saw the figure of a man with long waves of dirty blonde hair, clad in faded, leather garments.
The figure turned to face the interior of the courtyard and waved his hand. Another, more brief flash of light erupted around her. When it, too, faded, Mawi-naa looked on in horror as the rock leopard ceased its attack and grew rigid, like a fallen leaf in the heat of the sun—frozen in form, back arched and jaws bared. Within moments, it seemed as though all hydration left its body, and it slowly crumbled to dust in the cool breeze drifting in from outside.
“Nature without control is chaos, Lii-jit,” said the figure, turning back to her. “I am Lakos, and I am your king.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Thayliss was at a loss. He had begun his journey into the dungeon tunnel with designs of rescue, and now he, himself, was in need.
It didn’t make any sense—none of it. What appeared as merely walking in a straight line was in fact a convoluted series of bends and turns, no doubt designed by a mind no less twisted. He felt as though he had been walking for ages but had yet to come upon any semblance of an actual prison cell. Which underscored yet another element of the dungeon’s vexation, the fact that he had lost all sense of time since entering the cursed tunnel.
Somewhere outside in the courtyard, Mawi-naa was subjecting herself to the whim of a crazed and bloodthirsty mob. Sacrificing herself to grant him the opportunity to make a difference. But he was failing her. He was failing them all.
Thayliss slumped to the ground, lost and alone.
Sitting on the cold stone floor, he pondered why he was fighting so hard to save a world that seemed to lack any affinity whatsoever for him. Perhaps the intense drive pushing him forward bore no more significance than that of an insect that had lost its head. For a time, the legs still propelled the creature forward, but there was no intelligence behind it. No true direction. Its progress was no more than the product of a lag, a delay in the time it took for the body to realize that the spirit had left. But eventually, invariably, the body, too, ceased to function.
As Thayliss lay, wracked with despair, he knew that this was what had happened to him. When the villainous warlord Lakos sent his beautiful Leysiia and her father to the next world, their spirits were not the only ones to depart. After that moment on the border of the Valla Forest, Thayliss continued forward, fighting for all the things he used to believe in so passionately: justice, honor, hope. But only because his body had been trained to do so. The heart, the spirit behind it, was gone.
Thayliss felt his journey finally come to an end. Reaching into his pocket, he removed a small packet of leaves tied together with a thin strand of willow branch. Untying the strand, he carefully unfolded the bundle to reveal a gelatinous, orange substance inside.
When they were still in hiding outside the tower, devising their strategy, Mawi-naa had obtained the sap from a nearby tallacia tree and cautiously packaged it. Handing it to Thayliss, she informed him that the sap was very toxic, with merely one drop capable of killing a Lii-jit or a human. The sap was also highly corrosive, able to dissolve through even the strongest of metals. Seeing as how Thayliss sought to liberate hundreds of presumably caged prisoners without the use of a key, this seemed an innovative, if not guaranteed, alternative.
But there were no prison cells, and the prisoners within them were nowhere to be found.
Thayliss could spend what little time he had left wandering hopelessly through the tunnels, fully aware that finding and liberating the mystic prisoners would be of little consequence. With each passing moment, he grew increasingly certain that they would leave the dungeons only to step out into a world that had already been conquered.
Alternately, he could put a merciful end to his pain and suffering and depart this world a free man. It was far from ideal, as such behavior went strongly against Ohlinn beliefs, but it hardly mattered now. Besides, he was not Ohlinn. He was a human. When he left this world, there was in all likelihood no other awaiting him. The thought of reuniting with Leysiia, spending an eternity in ethereal bliss, was a fanciful notion and no more. He had lived a lie. And it was time to put that lie to rest.
Thayliss stared at the innocuous-looking orange sap in his hands and pondered its effects. If it was truly as lethal as Mawinaa had said, then this would all end soon.
About to dip his finger into the substance, he paused, distracted by what appeared to be a faint light emerging up ahead. He paused and looked up, seeing the figure of Leysiia standing before him, barely visible against the flickering torchlight.
Thayliss couldn’t be sure if his eyes were deceiving him. Unlike the vibrant, detailed image he had seen during his Ohlinn meditation, what he now saw—or, at least, what he thought he saw—was little more than a vague, expressionless image. Thayliss wiped his eyes, unconvinced that what he was seeing was actually there. As he looked again, the image grew fainter still, seeming little more than the suggestion of a tall, thin silhouette cast by the play of torchlight upon clouds of dust.
“Leysiia!” shouted Thayliss, as the image disappeared completely.
He was crushed. The image offered no guidance, no support. No soft, gentle smile, urging him onward. Perhaps the sighting was no more than the product of his desperation and delirium.
Thayliss once again looked upon the orange substance held in his palm. It was time.
“Hello?” a muffled voice echoed up ahead.
Thayliss looked up, squinting into the darkness. “Hello? Is there anyone there?” he shouted.
After a long pause, the voice replied. “Yes, we are imprisoned here. You must help us!”
Thayliss gently re-tied the leaves around the orange sap, slipped the package back into his pocket, and rose to his feet. Walking ahead, he called out, “Speak again. Let me follow your voice.”
“We’re over here,” shouted the voice. “Then again, of course we’re here. Everywhere I go, I’m here. At least to me. Much as, I suppose, you are there. Wherever that is.”
Thayliss heard the voice more clearly this time. It seemed to originate up ahead but slightly to the right. Despite the tunnel still lacking any perceptible branches or deviations, he now had a slight awareness that the path curved gently to the right.
“Are you here to rescue us?” asked the voice.
“I am,” Thayliss replied, cautiously stepping forward. “Rather, I shall try my best to do so.”
“Many blessings to you,” the voice replied, louder and clearer still. “I feared that these dark walls would be my last sight on this world. If you can consider near darkness to be any manner of sight.”
Thayliss turned a corner, seeing row upon row of bars before him, each containing dozens of individuals. However, within the cell directly in front of him, standing just on the other side of the bars, was the source of the voice that beckoned.
“Tiig!” Thayliss called out, feeling an immense sense of relief that the little Lii-jit was still alive. “Thank the spirits,” he said, stepping close to the bars. “I feared that you—”
Thayliss felt his shoulders grasped tightly as his body was pulled against the bars, his face pressed up against the cold metal. Tiig held him in a firm grip and glared at him, seething.
“You have the utter gall to return to me, human?” he said, his jaw jutted, and lips curled. “Traitor! Scoundrel! Were I not behind these bars, the entirely of these cursed stone walls would echo with the sound of your screams as I unleashed my wrath upon you. You and your gluttonous kind are responsible for all of this.”
“But, Tiig,” pleaded Thayliss, “I’m not a part of this! I’ve come here with Mawi-naa to rescue you, all of you, and stop Lakos before it’s too late.”
Tiig’s eyes grew more intense still as he held Thayliss so firmly against the bars that the air was forced from his lungs. “What of Mawi-naa?” he asked. “I could not elude your filthy kind, but she ran to the safety of the trees—I saw her myself. If you harmed her, I will pull you through these very bars. She was our last hope.”
“I’m not one of them,” whispered Thayliss, every word expelling precious air from his aching lungs.
“Then why do you dress as they do?” Tiig screamed, thrusting Thayliss away from the bars, on the verge of slamming him into them again.
Thayliss breathlessly struggled to reach into his pocket and extract the parcel. Feeling his field of vision slowly begin closing in, he dropped the package into the cell.
Tiig, peering down at the object, released Thayliss and knelt down quickly to pick it up.
“Where did you get this?” he demanded.
“I told you,” replied Thayliss, leaning forward with a hand placed upon his battered chest. “I’m with Mawi-naa. She created a diversion that enabled me to enter the dungeons to rescue you. All of you. But we don’t have time to argue. You have to believe me.”
Tiig unfolded the package and saw the orange sap, his rage turning instantly to ebullience. “It’s brilliant,” he said, rushing to apply the sap judiciously to the cell’s large, steel lock.
Almost immediately, the shimmering metal lost its luster, emitting an acrid gray smoke as it grew rusted and porous.
“You may wish to stand back, human,” said Tiig. He kicked the gate, snapping the now-fragile lock and swinging the cell’s door wide open.
“Now, I trust you know the way out of here,” said Tiig, busily applying the sap to the locks upon the multitude of prison cells around them. Not hearing a reply, Tiig stopped what he was doing and turned to him. “There is only silence. Why is there only silence? Surely you did not come all this way to release us from these cells only to have us perish wandering these treacherous tunnels, did you? The sheer breadth of human ineptitude never ceases to appall me.”
Thayliss had heard enough. He strode over to the angry Liijit and pressed him up against one of the cells. “Listen to me, Lii-jit,” he snarled. “I do not know from where your bottomless contempt of my kind arose, but the acts of one hundred humans—of a thousand—do not equate to the actions of all. Your sister is quite possibly the kindest, most sincere being left on this world, but you yourself serve as living proof that one cannot generalize a race of beings on the basis of one individual. There is quite enough hatred and ignorance outside of this dungeon. We do not have use for more.” With that, he released his grip on the wide-eyed little mystic.
The two beings stood in uncomfortable silence for a moment, each lost in his own whirlwind of thought.
Finally, Thayliss spoke. “I had no knowledge of this dungeon’s devious design. I do not know the way out.”
Tiig was about to reprimand him but stopped, appearing to formulate an idea. “The legend of the sacred tower spoke of its original construction by Masdazii builders. I cannot say for sure, but the possibility exists that this same design was adopted in its reconstruction. If that is indeed the case, then we need only liberate the Masdazii captives and follow them out. Out they go, out we go. Simple.” He gestured toward several cells containing a number of the large, oafish matter-mystics.
“But what of the spell that consumes them?” asked Thayliss. “Look around—we are surrounded by hundreds of mystics, Liijit, Masdazii, and Ohlinn. And yet we are the only two beings in this dungeon who retain our conscious will.” He pointed toward the cells whose locks were already dissolved by the sap. “These prison doors swing freely open, and yet their captives remain motionless. They still follow silent orders from the one who rules from the tower throne. Until that power is taken from him, we are the only two beings in this convoluted dungeon who aspire to leave. And as long as that is the case, it will never happen.”
As much as he wished it not to be so, Tiig knew Thayliss was right. “We cannot leave without breaking the spell, and yet the spell cannot be broken while we remain here. We are in need of a miracle.”
At that moment, a third voice emerged from within a darkened cell. “No, my lads. You simply need one who can light the way.”
An electric rush of anger and contempt surged within Thayliss as the figure grasped the bars and leaned into the light, accentuating the deep grooves along its weathered face.
“Now why don’t you see me out of this miserable cell?” Gris Hallis asked.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
“Please, my dear,” said Lakos, “try to relax and enjoy the view.”
Following the incident in the courtyard, Mawi-naa had been escorted up to the throne room where, forced by a power she was unable to resist, she now stood upon the ledge overlooking the Inner Realm far below. Ribbons of swirling incandescent light wrapped around her, holding her firmly in place, arms at her sides and looking straight ahead. Any attempt to struggle or break free from the mysterious force seemed to only tighten its grasp.
For some time after arriving in the room through the black gate, Lakos sat quietly on his throne, relishing in his new prisoner’s struggles.
“You know, the energy that binds you can just as easily release you,” he said, consuming a handful of berries he had taken from the festivities in the courtyard. “However, I doubt even a nimble Lii-jit could survive a fall of a thousand strides. Why, just earlier this evening, I attempted it with an Ohlinn, and the results were, shall I say, less than encouraging. But truthfully, it is not an outcome that I wish for you to repeat.”
He rose from his seat and approached her. “There was a time, mystic, when I would have put my sword through you on first laying eyes upon you.” Lakos reached out his hand, gently caressing Mawi-naa’s cheek.
“Why such hatred?” she asked, slightly relaxing her tense body. “Whatever wrongdoing befell you in the past, surely the Lii-jit were not involved.”
