The Floating City - Chapter 21

The Odd Experiment

Roshan heard a bang, followed by loud cheering audible even in the hush of the Alsce library. It had been three days since the arrival of Rika, Isa, and the others of Syd’s crew, and the celebrations had never stopped. First it was to honor the opening of the mountain passes, then for Syd presenting the Don with the Foinse-rod. Roshan didn’t know if most of the villagers and other Resistance members understood the import of that, but they knew a victory had been won over the Prime and that was enough to continue the party. He wasn’t sure what the festivities today were in honor of, maybe people had just forgotten how to be sober.

“Can I go to the party now?” Isa asked. She was sitting cross-legged in the center of a ring of Fòrsic symbols, wearing a pure white robe and her customary headscarf. Her arms were bare, their Fòrsic traceries glowing gently against the dark background of her skin. She looked grumpy.

“No,” said Roshan. “Not until we run some tests.” The ring was as secure as he could make it. He’d learned a few things about handling Fòrsic energies safely in his time in Alsce, and he was putting them to use.

“You agreed to this, you know,” said Rika.

“I wouldn’t have, if I had known it would take this long.”

 “Do you want to be blown up? Because not taking precautions here is how you get blown up.”

“Hush,” Eithne said. “Let the man work.”

Roshan gave her a grateful smile. Isa made a gagging motion, and Rika rolled her eyes. Surveying his handiwork, Roshan nodded and wiped his chalky hands on his trousers. He arose from his squat and stretched, his back popping. “Alright, I think we are ready.”

“Are you sure you know what you are doing?” Isa said.

Roshan shrugged, “it would not be an experiment if I did.”

“Forgive me if I do not find that at all comforting.”

He smiled, “Do not worry, the theory is sound.”

“That is not very comforting, either.”

“It is very simple, the healing crystal Rika used channeled Earth based Fòrsa with a physical affect. When it rebounded, it resulted in an Earthquake. Same energy, same affect, very different effect. So, if we use a crystal with a different Fòrsa base and a different type effect, but the same thing happens...” he trailed off.

“We have already gone over the theory behind it,” Rika said. “I think what Isa is worried about is what the after effect will be.”

“And what you are channeling at me in the first place,” Isa added.

“Oh, sorry,” he held up a small crystal. “It is my lucky crystal, got me out of Eolas safely. It is water energy and mind affect, it brings sleep.”

“You are not putting me to sleep,” Isa said.

“No water energy,” Eithne said at the same time. “Not in the library. No fire either, for that matter.”

“Fine fine,” Roshan thought for a second, and then rummaged through his pockets. He came up with another, equally small crystal. “How about this one? It is air and spiritual. It is very minor, it just gives you a feeling of contentment.”

“Been feeling down, Roshan?” Rika asked.

“Ah, well,” he dug his toe in the ground and looked down.

“Oh, Roshan, you should have told me!” Eithne put her arm around him. He leaned into it and sighed.

Rika clapped him on the shoulder. “We’re back now, so things are looking up, right?” She looked at Isa.

Isa nodded. “We’ll pick up the slack. Now, I say let’s get this over with.”

“Alright,” Roshan said, nodding. It did feel good to have his two friends back again. He had never had a lot of them, and the ones he did have he treasured. He still missed Aki, and he hoped she was all right. Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, he stepped forward. He held up the crystal, “are you ready?”

“What did I just say?”

He smiled and handed the crystal to her. “Hold it close to your chest, close your eyes, and breathe out onto it slowly.”

Isa did as he had instructed, and the crystal began to shine with a warm, golden glow. The effect was almost instantaneous. Isa had enough time to smile widely and say “it’s working” before the tenor of the glow changed. The color of the stone changed to a harsh metallic sheen, and Isa’s eyes snapped open.

There was no pupil or Iris. Instead the glowed a brilliant gold, bright enough to light up the room. “Get the stone away from her!” Rika yelled. Roshan darted forward, but stopped suddenly as Isa spoke.

“THE STONES FAIL,” her tone was flat, lifeless, but her voice filled the space of the library with a stentorian hugeness.

“er, what?” Roshan said into the silence that followed Isa’s pronouncement.

Her glowing eyes turned on him. He found the effect to be very unsettling. “THE STONES FAIL,” Isa repeated, and then said a third time. “THE STONES FAIL. THE ROCK FALLS. THE BEGINNING IS IN THE END,” her body seemed to rise into the air. Against his better instincts Roshan stepped forward, but as he did the glow in her eyes abruptly stopped. Isa’s eyes rolled upwards and she collapsed toward the floor in a dead faint.

Surprising himself, Roshan caught her before she hit the ground and lowered her down gently. Rika and Eithne were at his side moments later.

“What in the Two Moons was that?” Eithne asked, her eyes wild.

 Rika said nothing, but her mouth was thin line and her brows were furrowed. She knelt down next to Isa’s prone form and put her ear to Isa’s face, and then to her chest. “She is still breathing and her heart is still beating, but look at her arms!” She pulled Isa’s robe over to reveal that the Fòrsic scarring had reached her shoulders, and loops and whirls were starting to grow inwards towards her chest. “I knew we should not have been experimenting,” she said, wiping at her eyes.

Roshan put what he hopped was a comforting hand on her shoulder, “we had to know. Now we can find a way to make it better.”

Rika turned on him. “And what did we find out, exactly? Other than some strange words at the cost of risking her life?”

“Sorry, I just thought…”

“You should have thought harder!” Rika paused, there was a short, brittle silence, and then she gave a long sigh. “I am sorry. I feel like I have been on edge for months now.”

Eithne gave her a quick hug. “We will figure it out. What the three of us do not know about Fòrsic theory and Fòrsic history is not worth knowing.”

“Thanks.”

“Did we learn anything, though?” She said to Roshan. “What happened to her?”

“I really have no idea. Some sort of prophecy?”

“I thought those were just in stories?”

“Using the spiritual affect is still not very well understood,” he shrugged. “I suppose some sort of glimpse into the future could be possible…”

“Or contact with a higher power.” Rika said.

Roshan turned to her, surprised. “What do you mean?”

“Her voice did not sound like her own, maybe it was something speaking through her?” She shrugged.

Roshan nodded, “it did sound very strange.”

Eithne tapped her fingers, thinking. “We pray to, and swear by, the two moons, Alos and Dar-Alos. I had never considered them as beings who took an interest in us, however.”

“Maybe something has changed?” Rika said.

“I am not a theologian, I am a theorist,” Roshan declared. “I do not know if gods exist, but I do think that I can do something about Isa,” he looked down at the prone woman, “is she still out?”

Rika checked her vitals again, as she did, Isa made a snorting noise. Rika laughed, “I think she is asleep.”

“Are you sure?” Eithne asked.

“I would know that dumb snore anywhere,” Rika said. “I have heard it whistling in my ears on far too many nights.”

“Good, then we have some time.”

“How can you possibly think you have a solution?” Rika said.

“For the last few months I have done nothing but study Fòrsic energy transference. If energy in causes a reaction, what happens when we take energy out?”

“You think we have not thought of that?”

Roshan shrugged. “Why didn’t you try it?”

Rika paused, then said, sighing, “We were not sure of the right runes.”

“Right. But I am sure,” he thought for a few moments, “Well, pretty sure.”

“I do not think ‘pretty sure’ is going to be good enough.”

“Trust me,” Roshan said, “she is my friend too.”

Rika looked him in the eyes for several long seconds, and then nodded. “Fine. What is your plan?”

“First, we need the Foinse-stone.”

“Foinse-rod,” Rika corrected him.

“Foinse-rod, then,” he looked at Eithne. “Can you get it from the Don?” Roshan sighed. “You might as well bring him along too, he’s probably going to want to see this.”

“Is this related to what he wanted to talk to you about the other day?” Eithne asked. When Roshan looked at her, surprised, she said “I am an historian, not an idiot. Besides, you are probably the worst dissembler I have ever met.”

Roshan smiled. “I guess I am,” he sat back and sighed heavily.  “For a few months now, the Don has been pressuring me to take my research in a… different direction. Namely, finding a way to drain Fòrsic energy rather than replenishing it.”

Eithne frowned, “That is more than just a different direction; it is completely contrary. Did he say why?”

“He was talking about using it as a weapon, but…” he gathered himself. “But that is not what I set out to do,” his voice came out more emphatic than intended.

Roshan expected them to laugh at him, or question his support for the Resistance. Instead, Rika nodded in agreement. “I know what that is like to have your research, your passion mistreated. It was why I joined the Resistance in the first place,” she put a hand on his shoulder. “The Don is wrong to pressure you this way, but I cannot believe that he does not have a good reason,” she was silent for a moment, moving, then added “although the weapons thing must be a misdirection, he should know better.”

“I have thought the same,” Roshan said. “He must know that any solution with the Foinse-rod, however necessary, is limited in scope. It cannot be the battlefield weapon he claims he want. It makes me… question his motives.”       

“That is understandable,” said Eithne, “but you should not be too harsh on him. The man bears a hard burden.”

“A burden I appreciate, though I wish I knew its origin,” Roshan shrugged, and gave a half smile half grimace, “I guess he will get want he wants, in the end, if we are to cure Isa.”

“It will be all right,” Eithne said, giving him a kiss on the cheek. Roshan reddened, but said nothing.

“I do not think it is that urgent,” Rika said, looking down at the sleeping Isa fondly. “Let us put her to bed, Eithne. Roshan, find Syd. She has known the Don longer than any of us, and should be able to allay your worries,” she met his eyes, “tell her the truth, she will listen without judgement.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Roshan said, nodding. It was certainly a better idea then any he had thought of.

“Come on, Eithne,” Rika said, stooping down and putting Isa’s arm over her shoulder. “This lazy girl needs her rest.”

“…uhh, what’s that?” Isa yawned, blinking sleepily as Eithne took her other arm and with Rika hauled her too her feet.

“Never you mind,” Rika said, “it is time for you to go to sleep.”

“I was asleep,” Isa said, but she laid her head on Rika’s shoulder and allowed the two women to lead her from the room.

Roshan smiled as he watched them go, but as soon as they were out of the room his expression faded. He didn’t particularly want to talk to Syd about his concerns about the Don, but he wanted to talk to the Don even less. It was for a good cause though, so he took a deep breath, and set off into the lodge to find Syd.

Finding Syd, however, was easier said than done. All the common spaces in the lodge, and most of the streets outside of it, were filled with drunken revelers. Resistance members and townspeople mingled together, and the din was such that Roshan had trouble hearing himself think. Eventually, he retreated to the lodge’s residential wing, but Syd wasn’t to be found there, either. As he turned to go, however, he heard a voice hailing him.

“Oi, Roshan!” Roshan turned to see Trentor coming out of one of the rooms in the hallway, he looked slightly disheveled.

“Trentor, what are you doing here, I thought you would be out carousing?”

“I could say the same thing to you, lad,” Trentor said, smiling. “I am getting too old for this myself. Two days of revelry, fine, but better to hole up with a wineskin and a pretty girl on the third.”

Roshan grinned back. “Fair enough. I was looking for Syd, have you seen her?”

“Why would you be looking for that sourpuss? I can’t think of anyone who hates fun like this more.”

“I have something I need to speak with her about,” Roshan did his best to sound casual, but Trentor didn’t seem to care.

“Well, good luck,” he said. “I would try the roof, anywhere outside and away from people, really. Myself, well, I’ve got the pretty girl,” he gestured toward the room he had left, “now I just need more wine.”

“Check the storeroom to the right of the kitchen,” Roshan advised. “One of the main cooks, Evan, told me there was a supply of bottles there.”

“Thank you kindly, lad,” Trentor said, clapping him on the shoulder. “I’ll do that,” he headed off down the hall. “Good luck!” he called back down the hall as he rounded the corner.

Roshan headed off in the opposite direction. Thanks to Trentor, he had a good idea of where Syd might be. The Resistance’s lodge in Alsce had a high, peaked roof, to slough off the heavy snows common to the region. There wasn’t a flat place to stand anywhere around it, but there were a few balconies high up by the eaves, and he was sure that she would be in one of them.

He was right, although he had to check several of the balconies before he found Syd and Simon. They were both drinking wine and looking out at the rash of stars above him. Simon turned around first as Roshan opened the door. “Roshan, what brings you out here?”

“Oh, uh,” he hadn’t expected Simon to be out here as well, although now that he thought about it he didn’t see why he was surprised, the two seemed to be inseparable. “I was looking for Syd…” he trailed off as both Syd and Simon looked at him expectedly.

“Well,” Syd said finally, “you found me. What do you want?” Her tone was welcoming, but her expression was anything but.

Remembering Rika’s advice, Roshan decided to just go for it. He took a deep breath, “I need advice about the Don,” Syd and Simon exchanged glances. “Please,” Roshan added, “it is important. It is about potentially curing Isa.”

Syd nodded “Simon, would you please go fetch us some more wine?”

“You sure?” Simon said, rising and grabbing the wineskin that lay between them.

“Yes.”

Simon headed for the doorway, giving Roshan a look on his way by that seemed to say “good luck.”

“Thank you.”

She waved it off, “I was thirsty. Now, tell me what is going on.”

“Well…” He launched into the story, starting with the first conversation he had had with the Don several months ago, and what he had learned from the experiment with Isa that afternoon. Throughout the whole retelling Syd was silent, an inscrutable look on her face.

As he finished, she just sat back on her stool and nodded.

Roshan looked at her for several moments, waiting for her to say something. Finally, he prompted, “well?”

“Well, what?”

“Well, well what should I do? You know the Don best out of all of us, can I trust him with this power, so that we can cure Isa?”

Syd shrugged, “do you have a choice?”

“That is not a very comforting answer.”

“It is not always a comforting world,” she leaned forward, and looked Roshan right in the eyes. “Alistair is a noble man, with noble virtues. Those virtues include honor, but they also include ambition, an indomitable will, and a thirst for vengeance.”

“So you know where he is from, why he started the Resistance?”

Syd sighed. “I am not sure anyone knows that. Many years ago, my village was burnt to the ground by a rival tribe backed by the Prime and his cronies,” as Roshan started to speak his condolences, she waved him down, “it was a dispute over water and mineral rights in the desert, and it escalated, as those things tend to do. We were not blameless, either. I survived, and ended up in Dak, penniless with just my sword and my horse to my name. It was there Alistair found me, searching for fellow malcontents in his war against the Prime.”

Roshan was shocked, it was most he had ever heard Syd speak about herself. “So he had already started the Resistance?”

“Yes. Even then he was charismatic and brilliant, and the mystery of his background added to his legend. His accent, however, gave him away.”

“His accent?” The Don had one of the most un-notable accents Roshan had heard. He could have come from any of the six cities.

“Back then he had not completely rid himself of his original. He is of the… upper crust, as it were, of Ater-Volantis.”

“Ater-Volantis? So he must be someone the Prime has wronged personally.”

Syd shrugged, “that is all I know. He is doing a good thing, with the Resistance, regardless of his reasons for it.

“So, can I trust him?”

“That is not the right question. You can trust him to do what he deems necessary, but that may not always be the action you think it is.”

“So what is the right question?”

“The right question is: can you afford not to trust him?”

“I…” Roshan said, and then paused, thinking. What was he afraid of, that the Don would take his research with the Foinse-rod and run? Using it as a negator of Fòrsic energies would be limited, just as restoring crystals afflicted by Síosar would have to be done a few stones at a time. On the other hand, if Roshan didn’t trust the Don enough to ask to use to Foinse-rod to cure Isa, then he was putting one of his only friends at risk over a matter of principle that was more a gut feeling than anything else. “Thank you.”

“You have decided what to do?”

“Yes, I need to go find the Don now,” Roshan stood up and turned to leave.

“He will likely be in his office. Oh, and Roshan,” Syd said as he opened the door.

“What?”

“Trust, but verify.”

He gave her a sharp look, but her expression was as impenetrable as ever. Feeling more sure of himself than he had in a long while, he turned away and headed down the narrow steps in search of Alistair Gaunt.

For Chapter 22 click here.

The Floating City - Chapter 19

The Darkened Room, Part 2

They raced down the dark corridor, Rika and Sean leading the way. Syd and Simon flanked Isa as she used the limitless power of the Foinse-stone to deter their pursuers. They pressed onward, moving forward to prevent themselves from being overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of the mine guards.  At a crossroads, Rika spared a glance behind. Simon was dropping back to Trentor, who was bringing up the rear.

“How are you doing, old man?” He asked.

“Not as old as you are!” Trentor said. He was clenching his teeth.

“I am not the one hobbling behind everyone else,” Simon paused, and gave his friend a considering look. “Foot?”

Trentor shrugged. “Someone’s got to bring up the rear.”

Ahead of them, Syd frowned. “How much further?” she asked Sean.

“Not much, we are almost through.”

She looked back at Trentor, who was panting more heavily. “Don’t… worry about… me.”

“Stay with him,” she said to Simon. “It would be a shame if we had to break out with only five of us.”

“Your… consideration… is overwhelming,” panted Trentor.

As they rounded a corner, Sean threw out his hand and stopped suddenly. “Dim the light!” When Rika obeyed, he lowered his arm and gestured for her to look around the corner. Nerves tingling, she slowly stuck her head around it, and swore as she saw what was on the other side.

“What is it?” Isa asked, whispering as she caught up to them.

“A road block,” Rika said. “Get Syd!”

Isa beckoned Syd forward, and the tall woman was there in an instant. “What?”

“The way is blocked. There’s a cadre of Choisant and a big net.” She had recognized the Choisant from the sigil sewn onto their black cloaks, a crystal set in the center of a spider’s web.

“Can you blast through them?” Syd asked Isa.

“The soldiers, definitely. If the net is anchored at all firmly…”

“It is,” Rika interrupted. “Pegs in the rock on either side of the corridor on both the top and bottom.”

“Then no.”

“Why not?”

“The runes we are using generate a blast wave of Fòrsa, but while it is good for hurling people and doors about, it would pass right through the net,” she shrugged, “think of it like wind. There are too many holes, so the force would be too spread out.”

Syd nodded, understanding. She looked at Sean as Trentor and Simon caught up to them. “Is there another way?”

Sean hesitated, thinking. “Do you have any rope?”

“Yes,” Rika and Isa both answered.

“How much?”

“We each have a coil of fifty feet of climbing rope,” Rika said. “Is that enough?”

“It’ll have to do.”

Simon frowned. “You are not thinking of…” he paused when he saw his brother’s grin and sighed. “Straight out of the top, then?”

“Straight out, indeed.”

“What?” Syd demanded.”

“You explain on the way,” Sean said, nodding at Simon. “The rest of you, follow me!” and he dashed off back down the passageway, before darting down a side tunnel that they had previously blown by.

“Go,” Syd said, and the group followed on his heels. “Where are we going?” She asked Simon again as they rounded the corner and caught up to Sean.

“They have probably blocked off all the entrances by now, if that net was any indication,” Simon said, by way of reply.

“Yes, and?”

“So there is only one exit left.”

“Simon,” Syd warned, “out with it.”

“Well, the Overseer’s office has windows, and a lovely view of the mountains…”

“So that’s why we need the rope,” Rika said, as she paced herself just in front of them.

“What is going on?” said Trentor, limping gamely after them.

“We are going out the windows and down the cliff face,” Simon said.

“It will be fun!” Isa said.

“Sure, if you are crazy. Isa, I think you have been close to too many explosions,” Trentor said. Isa turned and winked at him and then went back to running. Trentor sighed, “At least the view will be nice.”

This set of corridors was different from the one they had been fleeing down before: brighter lit, and with smoother sides. These were clearly the more used areas of the mine, and Rika thought she smelt food cooking. Simon had said that there were communal rest areas throughout the mine. That meant people, but these tunnels were empty. “Where are all the workers?” Rika asked as they ran on.

“Protocol for an intrusion is for the guards to defend the entrances, while the workers are sequestered in the dining hall,” Sean said, in between breaths.

“Couldn’t they help, too?” Isa asked.

“Relations between the workers and the Overseer are at an all-time low. They would as happily help us as help him.”

“After all, you are here,” Rika said.

“He is a special case,” Simon said from behind them. “The mine is a convenient sideline for those in my family’s line of business.”

“How little you know, little brother. Things are different now. Relations are… strained.”

“Much to the family’s benefit, I assume.”

“Only because we choose to see it that way. Disruptions are bad for business, but they do bring other opportunities.”

Simon opened his mouth to question his brother further, but Syd stepped up between them. “Talk later. Run now.”

They ran on. The corridors were now brightly lit, well-traveled paths. Signposts pointed the way to a bar, a tea shop, and to the dining hall. It was a veritable deserted city under the mountains of Crystalis. Their footsteps echoed in the stillness up and down the smooth-worn halls, and Rika could feel hairs rise on the back of her neck. “Too quiet,” she heard Isa mutter under her breath. “I do not like it.”

Rika winked at her. “Do you ever like quiet?”

Isa stuck her tongue out at her. “This is different, it’s…” she searched for a word, “oppressive.”

“I know,” Rika said, becoming serious again. “I feel it too.”

“We all feel it,” Simon said. “Keep your eyes and ears open.”

The air felt thicker, heavier, and the sounds of their footsteps vanished into the corridors like pebbles into a still pond. Looking at her arm, Rika could see all of her hairs were standing straight up, and Isa’s thick, black hair was actually lifting up her headscarf as strands wriggled free from her braids. “Isa,” she called, “your hair!”

Isa checked her own arms, “Alos fend.”

“What?” Syd demanded.

Isa was looking around at all of them now, eyes wide. “Fòrsa,” she said. “This corridor is filled with it. It’s why it feels so… static-y.”

“Is it a trap?”

Isa looked at Rika, who shrugged in response. “There is probably enough energy in the air to cook us all, if it discharged.”

“Oh, excellent,” Trentor said, catching up as the group paused to take stock. “I love it when it is good news.”

“In a way, it is,” Rika said. “We are still alive, after all. A trap would have triggered by now. This is…something else.”

“We do not have time for this,” Sean said from further up the corridor. “The Overseer’s chambers are right around the corner. We must go, now!”

“Whatever is happening,” Syd said, “It has not harmed us yet. Let us go before whoever holds this power changes their mind.”

Or finishes whatever they need all this energy for, Rika thought to herself as they rounded the corner. It was not comforting to think about. Whatever was drawing all this energy, she could not imagine it being used for a beneficial purpose. Not in a place where those in charge were actively experimenting with forbidden and dangerous techniques.

The doors to the Overseer’s quarters were indeed nearby, at the end of an ornate, brightly lit, stone hallway. The corridor they had come from opened up near the end of it, leaving the entrance to the Overseer’s chambers at the end of a small cul-de-sac, marked by a garish set of oaken doors. They were covered in gilt with ornate bronze handles, and they were also… vibrating? Rika peered closely at them, trying to figure out why they seemed to be shaking faintly in their frames.

“It appears the Overseer is not given to understatement,” Trentor said, as the group paused to survey the entranceway.

Simon turned to his brother, “do you think he is inside?”

“Only one way to find out,” Sean reached for the bronze door handle.

“Wait!” Rika hissed.

Sean paused, looking back at her. “What?”

“Do not touch it, something is wrong.”

“I feel it, too,” Isa said.

“Everyone back up,” Syd commanded, and the group slowly backed away from the door and into the side corridor from which they had entered. “Now,” she said once they were all back in the side corridor, “What is going on?”

“I think the door is rigged, somehow,” Rika said.

“I agree,” said Isa, “The doors are charged with energy. You can see them shaking.”

“Is this related to the Fòrsic buildup we have been sensing?”

Isa and Rika both shrugged. “Could be,” Rika said.

“We would have to trigger it to be certain,” Isa added.

“Can you open the door without triggering it?”

“Maybe, but It would be easier to trigger it,” Rika said. “If we bleed off the Fòrsic energy, then we can just open the door.”

Syd stared at them both, thinking, before nodding decisively. “Do it.”

Rika and Isa exchanged a quick grin. “On it!”

“And hurry,” said Sean. “We cannot wait here forever.”

Rika waved her hand airily at him, but Isa was already occupied with planning their approach. She peered out around the corner, her senses searching for any reaction and her body prepared to jerk to safety in an instant. She stared intently at the door for several moments, and then pulled her head back. Rika was right behind her.

“Strange, right?”

“Yes, it’s very faint, but you can feel the tension.”

“What do you think?”

“What’s that cliché, tension you can cut with a knife? I say we cut it -- with a rod,” Isa waggled the Foinse-rod at Rika.

“Blowing things up is your answer for everything.”

Isa stuck her tongue out. “A trapped door is not a trap if there is no door.”

“The door does not need to be the focus. It could be triggered if something crosses the frame, or if the door opens. In the first case, we die even if we blew the doors down, and in the second, blowing down the doors kills us anyway.” 

“I know that,” Isa said, “but it should not matter if we use enough Fòrsa. A large enough blast will disrupt any triggering mechanisms. Maybe.”

“It is inelegant.”

“But efficient!”

Rika thought for a moment. “Fine,” she made a calming gesture as Isa clapped her hands in excitement. “Wait, before you run off and do something stupid. I am still worried about the discharge frying us where we stand. What if we reflected it before it reached us?”

“Reflected, how?” Isa said, and then answered her own question. “Oh, I see. That is crazy!” She paused. “Let’s do it!”

Five anxious minutes later, Rika watched as Isa braced herself in the center of the main corridor, with Rika’s crystal studded buckler held at chest height. Three of the five crystals embedded in the shield’s surface were glowing, a triangle of light signifying that the shield would reflect Fòrsic energies. The Foinse-stone was strapped to the back of the shield, the paint of its blast wave creating runes scrapped off and replaced with a new set, mirroring the ones on the shield and increasing its effectiveness. At least, theoretically.

While Rika had been preparing the shield, Isa had been using up the rest of their meager supply of paint on the main corridor, laying down a series of runes to direct Fòrsic energies to a single point. After poking weapons, and then themselves, out into the hallway, they had ascertained that whatever the energy build up was, it was not reactive to them being in the corridor. Still, they had moved the rest of the group even further down the side passageway, except for Simon.

“Are you sure this is going to work?” He asked, as Isa gave them a nod to say that she was set.

Rika shrugged. “Yes, I think so. It is the best way to protect the rest of us, and the energy the Foinse-stone emits is immense. That shield could reflect an Ater-Volantis lift crystal... I think.”

“You think?”

“There’s only one way to know for sure. Can you hit the door from here?”

Simon looked into the corridor, “It will not pose a problem.” He hefted a fist-sized stone and hurled it the door before diving back into the side corridor. The rock hit the door to the Overseer’s chamber with a resounding thunk. Nothing happened. Simon and Rika looked at each other, and then out at Isa.

Isa looked back at them. “Well, that was anti-climactic,” she said, relaxing. “Throw…” but whatever else she was about to say was cut off as a titanic beam of Fòrsic energy erupted from the door and slammed into her small, metal buckler.

“Isa!” Rika screamed as the wind from the backdraft slammed into her and Simon in the wall of the side corridor. The breath rushed out of her in a whoosh and she blinked rapidly, trying to regain her sight. Her ears rang with a high-pitched buzzing sound, and she felt blood trickling out of her nose.

“What… was… that…” wheezed Simon next to her.

“I don’t know,” she tried to snap back, but heard only a croak emerge. “ISA!”  

Syd and Trentor were at their side moments later. Trentor checked them both carefully for wounds. “Are you all right? What happened?” Syd asked hurriedly.

“I’m fine…I…don’t…Isa!” Rika stammered out. Trentor pulled her to her feet and slapped a hand hard on the small of her back. “Thanks,” she said, surprised to be able to take a breath.

“An old combat trick,” Trentor said, as he turned to do the same to Simon. “But anything for our theorist.”

“Oh my,” Syd said. She stood in the main corridor, her hand covering her mouth.

Rika rushed out into the corridor. The stones down the middle of it had been charred black in a single, straight line, about as wide as Rika was tall. The char narrowed to a point where Isa had been standing. Rika looked around frantically. Further down the corridor, there was a limp, black-haired body, limbs and braids spread akimbo. “Isa!” Rika cried as she rushed to her friend’s side. She was still holding the blackened shield, but as Rika touched it, it crumbled into dust, the Foinse-stone clinking to the floor.

Isa was barely breathing, but her eyes fluttered open as Rika cradled her head. “Ow,” she said, so softly that Rika had to bend her head to hear her.

“It should have been me out there,” Rika said.

“I’m… braver… and dumber… than you. Made… sense.”

“Hush,” Rika looked up back down the corridor. “Alos guide us,” she breathed. The door to Overseer’s quarters was simply gone. The ragged hole where it had been showed that the reflected energies had actually enlarged the doorway. The blast had travelled straight through the chambers and out the windows on the other side. Daylight, real daylight, was streaming through.

“Did… I do… good?”

“You did fine, love,” Rika checked her friend over carefully. “Quit the dramatic talk though, you’re not dying.”

“I… know,” Isa said sitting up. “I just like talking like that.”

Rika laughed in relief, and wiped her tears away. Life without Isa was not something she wanted to think about. “Let’s get you up,” she said, and helped Isa struggle to her feet.

Isa let out a gasp as Rika pulled her up and clutched her shoulder.

“What is wrong?”

“I think it’s broken,” Isa took a step, and then switched to clutching her side. “My ribs, too.”

“Everything all right?” Syd called from where she stood further down the corridor.

“Isa is banged up, but we are all right,” Rika called back as she slipped her arm underneath Isa’s and helped her limp toward the rest of the group.

“We need to go, now!” Sean said, glancing around the hallways uneasily. “Someone else will have heard us.”

“Everyone will have heard us,” Trentor said. “That was the loudest noise I have ever heard in my entire life. Living inside of a thunderclap would be quieter than that noise.”

“All according to plan,” wheezed Isa as she and Rika reached the group.

“Oh, really?” Trentor arched a bushy eyebrow. “You meant to blow yourself up?”

“Well, no, but we broke through the door, triggered the trap, and no one died, so…”

“We can discuss this later,” said Syd. “It is time to leave.”

The group hurried down the corridor, Rika supporting Isa’s limping, hunched-over form. The Overseer’s quarters were as ornate and ostentatious as the doors had been, and they were almost as destroyed. “I guess we will not trip on anything on the way out,” Trentor said, gesturing at the swath of destruction that led out to the broken windows.

“You are welcome,” Isa said.

“I cannot wait to get out of here,” Rika said, “This place gives me the creeps. It feels like a storm is coming.”

“A storm IS coming,” came a voice, low, throaty, and unmistakably feminine. The group whirled toward the sound. The speaker was a tall, dark-haired woman, dressed in black and crimson robes emblazoned with the spider-web of the Choisant. Rika fought an urge to gasp. The woman was holding a severed head as casually as if it were a handbag.

“Who are you?” demanded Syd.

“The new Overseer, of course. The old one was ineffectual. He was… terminated from his position,” She hefted the head, and light flashed off of the crystals protruding from the eye sockets.

“Crystals in the eyes,” Rika said, “Careful!”

“I thought you said blood magic does not work,” Trentor said.

 “Blood magic did not work, but the world is changing,” the woman said. “The age of Fòrsa is ending. Allow me to demonstrate,” she lifted the head, and the crystals embedded in its eyes began to glow a sickly green color. The mouth opened, and the hair on the back of Rika’s neck began to tingle as energy gathered. “I have enjoyed watching you scurry about my mines, but it is time for you to leave now – and you may even serve a higher purpose once dar-Alos has gathered your souls.”

“No!” Isa cried as the beam building in the head exploded outwards. Dragging Rika with her, she threw herself in front of the group, raising the Foinse-rod still clutched in her injured arm. Thunder pealed, deafening in the enclosed space, and everyone was thrown to the ground. The beam, however, was reflected back. With another ear-shattering bang, the head burst. The impact threw the newcomer through the wooden partition behind her.

“What in dar-Alos’s name is going on now?” asked Trentor.

“I have no idea,” Rika said. “Help me get Isa up, and let us get out of here as fast as possible.”

Isa was out cold, a limp weight pinning Rika to the floor. Rika had tried her best to catch her friend with her body, but now she was having trouble getting out from under her. “I had no idea you were this heavy,” Rika muttered, as Trentor and Simon hauled the two women to their feet.

Isa’s eyes fluttered open briefly. “How rude,” she said, and then she was limp again, although her hands still clutched the pristine Foinse-rod. Rika queasily noted that the spiraling scars on her arms, the legacy of the previous summer’s incident with the bandits, were glowing faintly. That cannot be good, she thought. However, there was no time to consider it further. Syd and Sean had also picked themselves off the floor, and were busily tying their ropes around a central pillar. “We need to leave,” Syd said. “I want to be on the ground before they come to investigate.”

“There is no way Isa will make it down by herself,” Rika said, looking out over the drop. The late Overseer’s quarters opened up onto a sheer cliff of at least forty vertical feet, overlooking the Crystalis. This would be a challenging climb, even under normal circumstances.

“I will carry her,” Simon said. “There is enough rope left over to tie her to my back.”

“All right,” Trentor said. “Let’s go. Preferably before any more terrible things happen.”

Chapter 20 can be found here.

The Floating City - Chapter 15

This is a big chapter for me, because it is, according to my notes / plan, halfway through the story! I want to thank everyone who has been following this story for their support, and I promise you an exciting finish!

The Mountain Village

An explosion shook the small testing chamber. Roshan cursed the stone ceiling above him trembled from the wumph of bursting crystals, covering him in masonry dust. This was the tenth such explosion, after the third, the Don had forbade him from experimenting in the vicinity of the village. He and a few other Resistance researchers had taken up residence in a small cave, high up on the mountain slope. The cave had been cleaned and furnished -- people from Alsce, the hidden mountain village of the Resistance, had previously used it as a hunting camp before the Don appropriated it.

Harshun, one of the Resistance’s Engineers, came up to him, shaking his head. Harshun was a fellow Thesian, with long, dreaded hair wrapped into a dense ponytail that he had covered by a brightly embroidered bandana. Roshan liked the big, brash man. He reminded him of Isa, with his excellent Engineering skills -- and penchant for explosions. “Too much charge, I think,” he told the man.

“WHAT?” Harshun asked, wiggling a finger in his ear. He, too, was covered in dust, and Roshan hoped, not for the first time, that the ceilings were well buttressed.

“Oh, knock it off,” Roshan replied acerbically, “that wasn’t nearly a big enough bang to deafen you through a wall.”

“No, guess not,” Harshun chuckled. “They seem to be getting smaller, actually,” he observed. He sounded mournful.

“That’s a good thing,” Roshan reminded him. “I think. It means that the energy transfer is working.”

“You think.”

“Hey, this is uncharted territory. Three months ago we didn’t think it was possible!” Roshan protested. Soon after his arrival in Alsce, Alistair Gaunt, the Don and leader of the Resistance, had sat him down and interrogated him on his Fòrsic knowledge. It had been an intimidating experience. At the end of their discussion, Roshan understood why so many saw this man as a leader. Angular and bony, the Don lived up to his name, while also exuding an intense energy and compelling charisma. His gravitas was helped by the whitest, bushiest mustache that Roshan had ever seen. The Don had questioned him for what felt like hours, and the end result had set Roshan up with a lab, a few Engineers like Harshun, and carte blanche to research whatever he felt necessary. From his experiences with Isa and Rika, Roshan knew that the Resistance relied heavily on innovative Fòrsic technology to maintain an edge over the Prime’s police and soldiers. However, while simple Forsic devices like lamps and hot-plates could be used by anyone, it took a trained Fòrsic engineer or Theorist to use the more complicated devices. People with that training didn’t exactly grow on trees, and the Resistance needed most of them to be out doing things; the result being that the Don, a former Theorist himself, was overjoyed to have a researcher like Roshan able to stay on site.

Roshan had spent months pouring over theory books in the Don’s surprisingly complete library, finally arriving at what he hoped was a solution to the ongoing catastrophic crystal failure that he had termed the Síosar. Fòrsic crystals were amazing in their flexibility, durability, and power, but all of the extraordinary acts they could perform were wholly reliant on the Fòrsic energy inherent in the crystals. That energy acted as a seed, drawing other energy to it, enabling crystals to give light, call lightning, and heal wounds, among other feats. When crystals reached Fòirceann and that Fòrsic energy dissipated, then the crystals were useless. But it was possible, theoretically, to transfer Fòrsic energy from crystal to crystal, and thereby stave off Fòirceann. According to the theory Roshan had pieced together from his extensive research, he should be able to use a specialized crystal to magnify the energy from a smaller, weaker seed crystal, draining it of Fòrsic energy but allowing him to spread that energy to a range of other crystals, empowering and restoring them in a way that was heretofore considered impossible. Initial experiments showed that his theory was mostly correct, but the energy transfer had so far proved… unstable.

“A point, definitely a point,” Harshun said. “I’ll miss the bangs though, when we finally get it right.”

“I won’t,” Roshan muttered, and Harshun laughed. It took almost half a day to make the long slog up the slope to the cave where they carried out their experiments. Roshan thought the exercise good for him, but he deplored anything that wasted the precious time they had remaining. When it came to stopping the Síosar they were up against a time limit that they knew was coming, but very frustratingly did not know when. Crystals in their current iteration could last another hundred years, or they could all be gone tomorrow. Without this crucial knowledge, each of their days was precious.

A knock sounded on the door to the cave, echoing down the entrance tunnel. Harshun yelled, “come in!”

A tousled brown head poked in around the doorframe and said in a high-piched voice, “sirs? Eithne sent me to tell you that it’ll be supper, soon, and you should come back down.”

Harshun gave Roshan a broad wink. “Oh, if Eithne says so, then I guess we must.”

Roshan sighed. “Fine,” he agreed. He turned towards the village boy who had delivered the message. “Hold up, Elias. We’ve got to close up, and then we can all go down together.”

The boy nodded, cheeks ruddy from the cold. “Can we take the sled?” He asked.

Roshan looked at Harshun, who repeated, “can we?” His tone was uncannily similar to the ten year old at the door.

Shaking his head, Roshan said, “I don’t see why not.” Elias clapped his hands in excitement, and Harshun looked as though he wanted to do the same. “I know why Elias is excited, but aren’t you supposed to be an adult?” Roshan accused.

“Some boys never grow up,” Harshun said, shrugging. “Besides, it’s fun!”

“I guess it is,” Roshan replied, grinning.

The two busied themselves securing the lab, as Elias shuffled back and forth impatiently in the doorway. “Hurry up!” He implored as the two grabbed their coats and headed towards the entrance.

“Patience, young one,” Harshun intoned as they wrapped their scarves and shrugged into their heavy jackets.

Elias ignored him, darting outside the door and into the outer cave. There, resting against the wall, was a toboggan of Roshan’s own make and manufacture. He had thought on his own boyhood in the foothills of these same mountains, although admittedly much further to the south and west of their present location, and he’d remembered how much fun sledding was. He had also remembered how miserable trudging through the snow could be, and so, upon learning that he would have to slog up and down a mountain every day to perform his research, had taken some preventive measures.

The toboggan that Elias was carefully removing from where it leaned up against the wall was long, made of the light but sturdy pine that was indigenous to the region. It had cushioned seats for three, with leather straps and a complex steering system of reins and rigging. The crowning achievement, however, was a low slung, wooden box on the back. Right now the box was latched shut, but when opened, it contained a Fòrsic propulsion system.  At full power it simply burned through crystals, but at lower settings could assist with hauling the sled up the mountain… or give you an extra boost on the way down. Eithne had told him that there was a waiting list of volunteers among the village children to run messages up to him… provided that they got to ride the sled on the way down.

Roshan helped Elias drag the sled out of the cave mouth and to the lip of the flat rise where the cave was situated. The cave squatted on the south side of the valley. The north facing slope meaning that the snow fell here more heavily and the winds blew stronger, leading to more twisted, stunted pine trees than in other parts of the valley. Combined with the dense snow pack, this meant that there was remarkably little separating them form the fields of the village below. From a distance, the curling plumes of smoke gave the village a welcoming look, and he was looking forward to dinner and to being warm. He sat in the rear of the sled, with Harshun in the middle and Elias in the front. Elias was positively vibrating from excitement, as Roshan took the reins in one hand and reached back, activating the crystals.

The sled shot forward, careening down the mountainside, and Roshan mentally patted himself on the back again for taking a crew from the village and banking up snow over the worst of the rocks. The sled fell like an arrow, the wind whistling in his ear and the cold air making his eyes water even behind his workshop goggles. Blinking, he swerved right, and then left, dodging around several copses of trees. The ride seemed to last forever, until he overcorrected on a turn nearly to the village and sent the three of them, laughing, into a soft snow bank.

“Again, Again!” Elias cried, but Roshan only ruffled his hair.

“Maybe tomorrow, kid,” he said. “Let’s get home.”

The main lodge of the village was cozy and warm, kept so by several roaring blazes. To avoid the darkness and solitude of the winter months, the villagers of Alsce had constructed a giant log lodge as a central meeting space. There, they served communal meals and played music to wile away the long winter nights. The Don had claimed this lodge as his own hall, when he had first arrived in the village decades ago. While it remained the heart of the village, it now served as the heart of the Resistance, as well.

After a hearty meal of venison stew, Roshan lounged near one of the fires, reading and trying to stay awake. A light touch on his arm snapped his eyes open, and he smiled as he saw a slim, red-haired woman standing in front of him. She was pale, with a thick braid reaching all the way down to her waist. As always, she had on a severe looking pair of spectacles, but the hazel eyes behind them were warm. “Eithne,” he exclaimed, “I missed you at dinner!”

She smiled back at him, somewhat ruefully. “I got held up in the library. You know how it is.”

“I do, indeed,” Roshan chuckled. The library was never closed, but Eithne kept a sharp eye on all its patrons, and several times she had roused him and sent him off to bed when he had dozed off over one tome or another. “Find anything interesting? Why don’t you take a seat?” He asked hopefully, gesturing at one of the padded leather cushions on the couch beside him.

“I can’t, I’m sorry,” she replied, and then as his face fell she added hurriedly, “Or rather, I can, but you can’t.”

“What?” Roshan asked, confused. Then, thinking, he answered himself. “Oh, the Don wants to see me?”

“Yes, but don’t worry, I’ll save your seat for you,” she said, plopping herself down on the cushion beside him.

“Oh, oh, all right, then,” he stammered, standing up and fighting the urge to sit right back down. “I’ll be back soon. I’m sure he just wants today’s report.” 

Eithne shifted over to his cushion and took a scroll out of a shoulder bag that Roshan had not noticed before. “Hurry back,” she said, making herself comfortable.

“I…right, see you,” and he turned abruptly on his heel and strode off towards the Don’s study in the rear of the building. He found Eithne to be a trifle disconcerting. Although there had been plenty of female scholars at Eolas, Roshan had never quite mastered talking to women on topics beyond Fòrsic research. Rika and Isa treated him like a younger brother, which was comforting and reminded him of home, but he felt differently about Eithne. They had such a good rapport when talking about books, so why…? ‘Phaugh’ he grumped to himself, and tried to focus instead on his imminent report to the Don.

Alistair Gaunt’s study was down a narrow hallway in the back of the meetinghouse, on the second floor. It was a small room. Although the workmanlike desk was bare, the office was made even smaller by the voluminous shelves lining the walls, scrolls and tomes packed into every available space. From this office, the Don managed the Resistance, challenging the might of a realm. The man always retired here after dinner, if he had dined at all. The Don kept himself phenomenally busy, a constant stream of visitors and Resistance members moved through his office, and as far as Roshan could tell, he did not appear to sleep.

The one luxury the Don permitted himself was a padded rocking chair, and he spent much of his time leaning backward in it with his feet up on the bare desk. Every time Roshan came to talk to him, he slammed his legs down and bounded up, his moustache quivering with energy. Today was no exception. “Roshan, Roshan, my dear boy,” the Don exclaimed, coming around the desk to shake his hand vigorously, “so glad you could make it down!”

“You summoned me here, Sir?”

“Quite right, quite right,” the Don said as he returned to sit in his rocking chair. “And why do you insist on calling me sir? Just call me Alistair, like everybody else!”

Roshan smiled. “As I’ve said every time, no one calls you just Alistair. They’d probably lynch me if I tried. Sir,” he added insolently. And then, in a more serious tone, “besides, it’s a mark of respect.”

“Oh, all right. I don’t suppose you’d consider it, even in private?”

“I’ll consider it,” Roshan promised, and Alistair smiled at him for a moment. Then, his expression abruptly turned grave.

“Harshun says you are making progress?” the Don inquired.

“What? Uh, yes,” Roshan responded, caught off balance by the sudden shift in subject. “We haven’t had a breakthrough yet, but we’re making progress,” he paused, then said, “I was going to tell you all this in my weekly report…”

Ignoring him, Alistair pressed the tops of his fingertips together thoughtfully, his steel eyes glinting behind his glasses. “So, we are still on schedule.”

Roshan shrugged mentally; evidently the Don did not want to wait to hear about his progress. “Yes. The energy bleed off is becoming less dramatic. I have a few more glyph combinations to try that should reduce it still further.” Roshan said calmly, although his stomach was flip-flopping around. He’d always hated presenting.

“And you think you will be successful before Syd and her team return with the Foinse-stone?”

“I think so,” Roshan answered, trying to sound confident. “I’ve had to invent a whole new runic symbol structure, but it certainly transfers energy successfully.”

“It just makes the receiving crystals explode?”

“Right,” Roshan shrugged. “Preventing those explosions is what we’re working on now. We don’t actually need the Foinse-stone for that, just for using this technique in a wider setting.”

Alistair seemed to be considering that. He stared at Roshan intensely for several moments and then in a low voice asked, “could you reverse the process, stealing energy from other crystals?”

Roshan shrugged again. “Theoretically, if you inverted the right symbols you could, but you would need somewhere to put the energy,” he paused, thinking more about it, and then said slowly, “Although, I don’t know why you would want to do that. It could be a powerful technique, but completely useless for what we are trying to accomplish here. We want to restore energy to crystals, not take it away!” He stared back at Alistair, trying to ignore the sinking feeling this question had caused. He hadn’t yet considered other applications of his research. It would be madness against the looming threat of the Síosar, but… it could be effective against the Prime and the forces of Alis-Dak. He decided he would have to be careful how he approached this issue, and waited patiently for the Don to respond.

While Roshan was thinking over these options, Alistair had continued to gaze at him intently. Now his whole demeanor shifted back to the jovial man he had seemed when Roshan had first walked in. “Of course, of course,” he said heartily, “it was just a touch of academic curiosity.” He made a show of consulting the Fòrsic-clock on the wall, “It is getting late; I will let you get back to your books. Do not think that giving your report early will allow you to slack off on this week’s update, though,” Alistair said, wagging his finger.

“Thank you, Sir. I won’t,” Roshan responded.

As he opened the door, the Don said, “Goodnight, Roshan. Say hello to Eithne for me, would you?” and winked.

“I, uh, yes, Sir. Uh, Goodnight,” Roshan stammered, and left, feeling thoroughly wrong-footed. The Don’s abrupt shift back to conviviality had not erased Roshan’s earlier misgivings about Alistair’s line of questioning. He had felt safe here, supported, and separated from the messy politics of Eolas and Ater-Volantis. Now he no longer certain felt certain that was the case, and the thought disturbed him. He missed Isa and Rika with a sudden pang. They may also be Resistance members, but they had treated him with honesty and forthrightness. What would they do in this situation? The only thing to do, he decided: move forward with his original research. If the Don wanted to misuse it by turning it into a weapon, well, he’d cross that bridge when he arrived there. The world needed a solution to the Síosar, and he would risk almost anything to be the one to provide it. Roshan nodded his head firmly, his decision made, and headed back down the staircase toward where a warm fire, and Eithne, awaited. 

Chapter 16 can be found here.       

The Floating City - Chapter 1

This is the first part of an ongoing series. I am planning on posting updates every Sunday. Feedback and comments are much appreciated. Enjoy!

The Frightful Discovery

“We’ve got it!” Roshan’s soft exaltation broke the quiet of the observation room.  He pointed at the readings on the crystalline screen in front of him.  “Look! There’s a clear decrease!”

Aki frowned. She was a sturdy, brown-haired woman, dressed in engineering leathers and with her hair pulled back into a no-nonsense braid. “I don’t know…” she said, leaning forward and tapping her stylus against her front teeth. “There is a decrease in each successive test, but it still could be the crystal failing.  It’s not necessarily anything else.”

“Phaugh!” Roshan made hand waving motions. He was tall, lanky, and prone to gesturing excitedly, and his russet-brown skin and green eyes positively glowed with excitement.  “You built this contraption yourself, and we both double checked the figures.  Everyone knows that Fòrsic energies degrade the emitting crystals over time, so we accounted for it! The decreased efficiency in energy shown here,” He gestured at the crystal tablet in front of him, “has to be from the energy itself, not the crystal.  This is it, this is definitive proof!” He pointed outside the observation chamber.  In the darkness in the cavernous room beyond came distinct flashes of light, coming at relative intervals but at scattered points around the vast chamber.  “Each crystal flashes five times at set, random intervals, right?”

“Right.”

“And we know the decay rate of this type of crystal right?”

“Right” Aki sighed. “Get to your point, I know all this.”

“I know, I know, sorry.” Roshan said. “But look at the decrease!” He pointed to the crystal tablet, its screen crowded with cramped figures. “It’s faster than we anticipated, almost infinitesimally so, but it’s there.  Our experiment was a success!” He paused, and said in a softer voice, “whatever the source of Fòrsic energy is, it’s running out.”

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Roshan paused outside of the lecture hall, pushed his hair out of his eyes, and tried to calm his breathing.  He could hear his adviser, Professor Filias, from the other side of the door, and he suspected that she would look askance at any interruption of her lecture.  His news might be important, but it would still have to wait.  Slowly and carefully, Roshan opened the heavy wooden door and poked his head inside the room.  The lecture hall was a bowl-like chamber sunk in the rock of the university’s foundations.  Professor Filias stood in the center, surrounded by rising rows of students in the brown robes of acolytes. As a senior level journeyman, Roshan stood out in his own robe of blue lined with gold. Professor Filias was a middle aged woman, with brown hair in a bob and liberally streaked with silver. Like Roshan, she wore a different robe from the acolytes, and looked resplendent in the scarlet and gold of a senior maester.  She was also the foremost theoretician in Alis Dak, maybe even on the whole continent.  With a smile, Roshan ducked into an open seat in the top row of the room.  The lecture was just beginning, and listening to Filias expound on Fòrsic theory would give him time to get his own thoughts in order.

“What do we know about Fòrsa?” Filias asked the room. Silence answered her, and, with a pause, she continued. “We know of its discovery, and we’ve talked in this class about how it came about. But what do we really know about Fòrsa itself?” She pointed to a brown-haired girl in the middle rows.

The girl stayed quiet for a moment, thinking, and then answered rather hesitantly, “well… we know how to use it, how to draw power into the crystals.”

“Ahhh yes, the crystals.  Truly unique, they are the only known way of channeling Fòrsic power.”

Filias pointed to a blond-haired boy in the front row. “How do they channel this energy?” she asked.

“The Runes”, the boy answered promptly.

“Ah, but why those symbols, and why these specific crystals?”

The boy frowned in thought, he seemed to be weighing his options.  Finally he answered, “I don’t know, sir.”

“Exactly!” Filias exclaimed. “We know the how. How certain runes cause certain effects, how to combine runes for different effects, even what mental muscles to flex to start the process and channel power through the runes and the crystals themselves.  What we don’t know is the why! We don’t know why only these types of crystals, out of all the minerals in the world. We don’t know why these symbols, out of all the written languages in the world.  We don’t even know where the Fòrsa, the power, comes from!”  She paused, and pulled a small crystal sphere from the pocket of her robes.  “Watch this.” And she threw the sphere at the first row of students.

Before it could reach them, crystalline wards inscribed in the floor blazed into light, and the sphere shattered on an invisible wall that sprung up around the students.  A huge wave of flame leapt from the broken sphere and broke against wall, before it abruptly fizzled out.  The lecture hall sat in shocked silence.

Filias began lecturing again as if nothing had happened. “We know enough about the physical nature of the world to know that every action should have an equal and opposite reaction…” she paused again, looking out at her rapt audience.  “You should probably write that down, it’s important.”

As the students broke out of their spell and furiously scribbled notes down, she continued.  “The energy for that flame has to come from somewhere.  Fire consumes fuel to burn, that’s how it works.”

She pointed at another student. “What fuel did that flame just consume?”

The student, a flaxen haired girl, shrugged. “Air?” she asked diffidently.

Filias grinned appreciably. “Pert, but more or less correct, fire does consume air or an element within it. But then why did it, as it were, flame out…?”

There was a collective groan at the pun and Filias waved a hand in acknowledgement. The flaxen-haired student answered again. “It ran out of whatever it was using for fuel?”

Filias’s grin widened. “Very good. What was your name again?”

“Elspeth, sir.” The girl replied.

“Well Elspeth, you are quite correct… under normal circumstances. The average flame can be snuffed out through starving it of fuel. In this case, the wards on the floor did that for us. But, the point stands. We can draw this rune” she chalked the rune for flame on the slate board behind her, “on this crystal,” as she held up another one of the crystal balls “and it will produce this reaction. We rely on this. Our society is built on this. And we do not know why it works the way it does!”

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Roshan waited until the last of the students had filed out of the room before going down to speak Professor Filias. She heard him clomping down the stairs in his heavy lab boots and turned from packing away her things to smile up at him. “Longing for simpler times, Rosh?”

 He smiled back, “Always a joy to watch you pound knowledge through thick acolyte heads.”

“As you know from personal experience, if I recall correctly. Did you need something, or were you just brushing up on your Fòrsic theory?”

“I do, actually. We’ve got significant results!” He grinned hugely, and then sobered. “They are… worrying. I wanted to run them by you before Aki and I did the final write up.”

Filias looked around the nearly empty lecture theater. “Is it what you expected?”

“Pretty much.”

She frowned. “Alright, let’s talk in my office.”                                         

Professor Filias’s office was small and wood paneled, tucked away in the back of Eolas University. The walls were lined with shelves packed with scrolls and books, and to Roshan’s nose the whole place smelled of parchment and varnish. It felt like a tinier version of the great university library, and it felt, for him, like home. The walk to the office had been spent in companionable silence, save for a few forays into small talk. Once they arrived, Filias shut and locked the door, touching a crystal set into the frame above the door so that it glowed with a soft, gold light, before offering him a seat in one of the comfortable leather chairs arranged in front of her desk. Once he sat down, she took a seat behind the desk and said, “Right, show me your results.”

He took a scroll out from a pocket hidden in the lining of his robe, and passed it to her across the desk. “What’s with the secrecy?” He asked.

“Oh?” Filias had put on a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles and was peering intently at the data Roshan had passed her.

“The locking the door? The, if I am not mistaken, rune against eavesdropping?”

“Ah… yes.” Filias was silent for several long moments. When she spoke again, it was halting, measured tone. “Your… research has the potential to be… upsetting for several… important people. Not the least the University review board.”

Roshan felt a sinking feeling in his stomach. “Oh?” it was his turn to say.

“If you like, I can run your preliminary findings by the committee, so that they can offer edits in order to have your dissertation be more… widely accepted.” Filias said, her face twisted in a sour grimace. “This is not coming from me, you understand, but…”

“I understand.” He said bitterly. It came out harsher than he intended. “They want to cover-up my findings.” He gave a soft laugh, and shook his head. “No wonder I could only find scraps on the topic. This isn’t the first time this has happened, has it?”

Filias shook her head sadly. “No, it’s not. My own Maester’s research was on a similar subject, but I allowed myself to be… encouraged… into following a different direction.”

Roshan sat back, a shocked expression on his face. "Why didn't you tell me about this?" He demanded. "You knew about this from the start, you even encouraged me!"

"I had hoped," Filias said regretfully, "that your results would be other than what you have found." Roshan snorted, but she held up a hand to forestall him. "I hoped also that certain... attitudes towards this line of research would change. I have been advocating such a shift with my not inconsiderable influence, but" she shrugged, "alas."

Roshan was silent for a long moment, his expression twisted up in a strange mix of emotions. “But this is important!” He finally said, anger coloring his tone. “Our whole society rests on Fòrsa and the use of the crystals… if they are failing, it could impact the entire world!”

“I know, I know!” Filias sounded frustrated too. “But this is the way things are. I strongly suggest you follow my advice. We can… mitigate… your research, and you can still publish! The information will still get out, people will still know… just… not as forcefully.” She was pleading now. “Roshan… It’s better than nothing!”

Roshan shook his head slowly from side to side, disbelief in his voice. “You always said that knowledge, that truth, was sacrosanct. Why are we here, if not to advance knowledge?”

“There are many kinds of truth.” Filias said softly, sadly. “Roshan, this is for your own safety! People have… disappeared pursuing this research. In fact, the last person I knew...”

“I never thought that you were a coward.” Roshan interrupted harshly. “This potential danger to our way of life must be published! I will not allow my research to be watered down. It’s been my entire life for FOUR circuits. Aki and I have put everything into this project. I am going to the board with this, and that’s final. I will deal with any consequences, but this information must be out there - Maker’s breath, the only reason this city exists at all is from Fòrsic Crystals!” By the end he was standing, and shouting, and when he was done the office rang with a brittle silence.

Filias sighed explosively, and seemed defeated. “Fine” she said finally. “I can’t stop you. But please, I beg you, be careful.”

“I will” Roshan said, his voice still harsh as turned on his heel and left, slamming the office door on his way out.

Chapter 2 can be found here.