Prologue
The Hermit Emerges
AN 1211 (AZ 1448) - Midsummer
Montan Tower, Mount Atreus, Notos
Atop Mount Atreus, the crumbling Montan Tower was a refuge for men with all manner of peculiar gifts. It was originally constructed as a place of training for the court sorcerers and soothsayers, but ever since the fall of the kingdom, it became a place to escape from the outside world. More than forty years had passed since the sorcerer Scipio cut all ties to the world that he might refine his arts. He did not intend to use his abilities for any particular purpose or any particular person. He dedicated his life to art for art's sake.
He was an old man now, surely in his twilight years. Though some of his fellow sorcerers sought to increase their lives beyond their natural span, he was quite content to leave the number of his days to Nature. Yes, there was much he could do with one more year, ten, a hundred, but too often there were consequences for taking more from the Gift than what is given to you.
This day he sat among the diviners. It was not an ability he himself was blessed with, nor did he have any great interest in the possible course the future may take, but he did have an interest in observing the diviners at work. Some would sit in silent meditation for hours on end, some would breathe in all manner of strange incense, others would cut apart birds to read the signs in their innards. There were many ways they would go about searching past, present and future. The efficacy of these efforts was highly doubtful, almost to the point that he doubted the existence of true divination entirely.
As Scipio sat there watching the diviners, Old Eunios wandered aimlessly about the chamber. Eunios was an old man when Scipio first came to the tower and no one knew his true age. Some said he had been in the tower ever since the old kingdom fell, but this was surely idle gossip.
As Eunios walked past where Scipio was sitting, he fell to his knees. Concerned for old diviner's sake, Scipio got up to help him.
"Are you hurt?" Scipio asked.
Eunios turned to Scipio and clutched at his wrists with his thin, skeletal fingers. His body was shaking and his misty eyes wide open.
"Fi... fire from the skies... It will consume these lands..."
Eunios tightened his grip on Scipio's wrists and held up his hands, saying, "A hand... A hand must guide the fire lest it consume all... Seek... Seek out the power thought lost... The power to guard the King..."
Eunios' eyes rolled back and his body went limp. Scipio was barely able to catch him before he fell to the floor. For a moment, Scipio thought Eunios had given up the ghost, yet he was still breathing but shallowly.
Scipio laid him down as gently as he could and then went to find one of the younger men to tend to him. All the while, he thought on Eunios' words. Though he had long been a skeptic about prophecies, auguries and divinations, perhaps now was the time to give them more serious consideration.
* * *
Ten days had passed since Scipio came down from the mountain to shed light on Eunios' prophecy. "The power to guard the King," he said. The capital seemed to be the first place to look, but what he was looking for was not there. The capital was not a welcoming place, but he was able to gather some clues to help guide his search. It was not much, though, so he resolved himself to make the circuit around the country in search of more information. It would be a long journey, but if there was any truth to Eunios' prophecy, time was of the essence.
As he entered the port of Girondin, his senses were alerted to a peculiar magical presence. He focused his energies to seek out this presence. If it was not what he was looking for, it was at least something that warranted his interest.
Girondin was a filthy city and it seemed that this presence resided in the filthiest quarter, where rubbish-lined dirt paths crisscrossed ramshackle hovels and both dirty half-starved children and various ill-favored animals ran loose.
The presence was in one such hovel. It had no door, only a flap of hide nailed to the lintel. Scipio pulled back the flap and cautiously went inside. The hovel was mostly empty, just a rude table, a couple stools and moldy straw scattered about the dirt floor.
The presence was here, he was sure of it, but where?
As he was looking around, a trapdoor in the floor opened and a black blur sprang up. He scarcely took a step back when a cloaked figure stood right in front of him with a knife at his throat.
"Don't kill him yet," a man's voice said.
From the trap door emerged a young man with a sword on his back. The sword. That was what he sensed.
"Your sword," Scipio said. "It is Durandal, is it not? The blade of the Knight Champion of Notos, last recorded in the possession of the hero Clovin in the last days of the kingdom."
"So you know my blade?" the young man replied. "Tell me your name, old man, and why you've come here."
"I am called Scipio, a sorcerer from the Eremite Tower. I sensed the power of your blade and followed it here. Odd that the bearer of one of the three great treasure swords of Notos would be found in a place like this."
"Let me kill him," the cloaked figure said.
Hearing the figure's voice, Scipio remarked in surprise, "A woman? No, just a woman. Something more..."
From the shadows of the woman's hood, Scipio saw the red eyes glaring back at him and could feel the faint dark energy that seeped from her even though she was suppressing her power.
"A Black Xotika..."
The Xotika woman pressed the blade into Scipio's neck to threaten him, but showed the precision not to shed so much as a drop of his blood, not yet at least.
"And why would a sorcerer from the old mountain tower come all the way here to Girondin?" the young man asked.
The treasure sword Durandal. The power to guard the King. Was this it? Even if it were not, explaining his purpose was not likely to make the present situation any worse.
"A diviner I know prophesied recently," Scipio explained. "He spoke of fire from the skies that consume all the land unless a hand were to guide it and he bade me seek out the power to guard the King."
"Fire from the skies, you say? Well then, old man, what do you know of the Promethean Alliance?"
"The story of Prometheus I know," Scipio replied. "I have never heard of him making any alliances, though."
The young man laughed.
"How long have you been in that tower, old man?"
"It is difficult to say," Scipio replied. "What year is it?"
"By our calendar, Twelve hundred and eleven."
It took Scipio a moment to recall his last year in the outside world and make the calculation.
"In that case, it would have been forty-three years this autumn."
"The old man would've still been a kid back then," the young man said. "So you don't know, do you?"
"Know what?"
"The Promethean Alliance, the noble company that'll deliver the sacred fire of freedom to the people of Notos."
A rebellion taking the name of Prometheus? Could this be the fire from the skies?
"Let me kill him, Rowland," the Xotika said. "He's too dangerous to leave alive."
The Xotika would not act without word from the young man, Rowland she called him.
"I have never heard of a Xotika serving a human," Scipio said. "Curiouser and curiouser..."
The Xotika pressed the knife against his neck again but as before she was taking great care not to do any actual harm until bidden to do so. Scipio needed work quickly before this Rowland decided to agree with her.
"I was thinking that I might lend my services to you, young man—Rowland, is it?"
Rowland eyed him skeptically and asked, "What've you got against the Zephyrians?"
"Nothing in particular," Scipio replied, "but if the successor to Durandal is going to raise a rebellion, perhaps he could use the counsel of old age. My abilities in the magical arts are of course included."
"You think you're the hand that must guide this rebellion?" the Xotika asked scornfully.
So she was able to read into his meaning that far. Perhaps he should not have been surprised. The only question was what Rowland would say to it,
Rowland stood there, apparently deliberating his options, before asking, "If I were to spare your life and bring you into the fold, would you be able to get other hermits from your tower to join you?"
"I can always try."
"How about training others to be battlemages?"
"I cannot say that I have ever instructed others before, but I can always try my hand."
Rowland did not spend any time mulling over the proposition, immediately asking the Xotika, "What do you think, Simona? Is he Zephyrian spy?"
With her free hand, the Xotika took hold of Scipio's wrist. He could feel her enter his mind. He did not resist, at least not by any conscious effort, lest she try to take by force anything that was not freely given. Her searching of his mind seemed to be a great strain for her and once she had exhausted the limits of her power, she withdrew.
Still wary, she told Rowland, "If he's a liar, he's a good one. I say we kill him just to be safe."
"And this is why I'm the leader and not you," Rowland said. "If it were up to you, Simona, the Alliance would just be you and me. You would've killed everyone else. Put your knife away."
The Xotika did so with considerable reluctance. Though she left not a scratch on him, Scipio still found himself touching his neck as if to ensure it was still attached.
A grinning Rowland extended his hand, saying, "Well, Master Scipio, it seems I've just got myself a conscience."
Scipio clasped wrists and replied, "If you did not have it before, Captain Rowland, you will have it now."
It was Scipio's fervent hope that his counsel would be enough to rein in this brash young man. He truly could destroy everything if left unchecked, but would Scipio's hand alone be enough to guide him?