Just a puppet on a lonely string; Oh who would ever want to be King?
As I can't seem to form a truly coherent thought about my life thus far, I'm forced to use my trump card. Enjoy. I'll have a real update soon.
As I fell, the world fell with me. All stone and ice, wind and water. We all plummeted into the yawning nothing; the unyielding city below our only destination. The bronze bell was the only one of us who would not be intimidated by this beast of a city. It made its presence known, a resounding gong as it crashed heavily into one of Vasser Vitae’s stony arches. Despite is fine masonry crumbling, the arch itself held under the bell’s tremendous weight, the bronze giant anchored firmly in its cracked foundation. I swung helplessly like a pendulum from the bell’s rope, my arms threatening to tear loose from their sockets. My weak grasp could no longer maintain its grip on the rope and I fell into a half frozen over basin.
The icy water clamped down on my chest like a vice, forcing precious air out of my mouth in a bubbling geyser. My back ached from the ice shattering entry, but I pushed back the pain, the last of my focus and strength expended on clawing my way to the surface. Sputtering as I broke through the freezing reserve, I weakly flopped my arms over the rim of the basin. The bronze bell, though now silent, still rung in my ears muffling the sounds of a crossbow
I called out to the crossbow man, but my voice was a raspy phantom, barely escaping my bruised throat. Sammei had to be informed and sound a retreat. Any other fighting in the city would just be suicide to the Crystalysians. Fortunately the archer’s trained eye was enough to spot me, and before shouting something indistinct to his companions, he rushed over to my side. Hauling me up by the scruff of my uniform, the marksman flopped me over his shoulder, swiftly carrying me away from the turmoil that still roiled about the fortress.
“Retreat…” I croaked, “We must…sound the retreat”
“You daft fool!” came the bubbly and familiar voice of Javanelle, giving my damp head a friendly knuckle “We all saw what happened up there, and those that didn’t see certainly heard. Sammei has already blown retreat, but she’ll sure as snow not be pleased about it.”
Dodging expertly through the streets of the city, Javanelle wound her way back to the gate, the remains of the Frozen Blade’s icy ramp shining like monuments to the fallen heroes strewn about it. Streams of Crystalysian forces joined her, all converging at the gate. Some carried their wounded compatriots, others cast wary glances back to the fortress, fear on their faces. Rushing as one out of the gate, Sammei was clearly in sight, sitting upright on her stretcher, propped up by a comical collection of odd sized pillows. Her face was anything but comical as she frowned at companies as they began to form ragged rows behind her.
By this time, Javanelle had lowered me to the ground, supporting my weight with my arm slung across her shoulders. No doubt she hoped that the General would not see my incredible weakness. Sammei would not be fooled.
“I do believe I’m beginning to understand you, jester,” Sammei’s withering look wasting away all the defenses I had left, “It would appear that whenever I have things in hand, something drastic and devastating appears. I know, deep down, somewhere, that you are solely responsible. Since unfortunately you managed to survive whatever display of idiocy I just witnessed on that roof, I can’t begin to hope that Vasser Vitae is securely in our hands?”
“Whether by his paradoxically keen mind or his super inflated ego, the Rain King did not march with his forces to Pyria,” I rasped out, squirming uncomfortably under the General’s glare, “Also, I have no doubt that he survived that blast. A shard wielder inside the city, with as much water as the Western Sea can give at his disposal; we’d be as good as dead. Challenge his ego and he will leave Vitae to crush your audacity. Our only chance of survival is delaying Dumarkius and bringing a combatant of similar caliber. The only way to fight a shard wielder is with another shard wielder.”
“You wish to bring our Lady to the battlefield?” sputtered Javanelle, almost dropping me with her befuddlement, “The queen has never left the castle for any wars!”
“Well if ‘Our Lady’ doesn’t wish for her armies to be decimated, she will have to come to our aid. Dumarkius is a pompous tyrant, but he’s no fool. His ambition has always fueled his persistence and now he has the clout to back it up. But we must act now.”
“Tell us, Jester, and we’ll do it,” piped a blond elementalist, the crumpled body of an elder mage cradled in arms. I recognized the blanched face as one who had been the first to cross into the city with me, victims to the Dense Water bombardment. Though the youth was soaked through and through, one could still trace the tracts of tears on his ruddy face. “This man taught me more than my art. He taught me what it meant to be a son. Is our Queen losing fathers? Brothers? Sons or daughters?”
I nodded slowly, watching Sammei’s face transform from a scowl to a terse line. Arms crossed across her chest, the General scanned the faces of the warriors under her command. Turning lastly to me, she replied “Very well, Pollo. Lead us onward.”
The night rang with insults of all flavors, including some in other languages, all reviling the Rain King. Come dawn, Sammei voice carried above the rest, invoking such lewd and crass taunts that even some of the soldiers around her blushed. Sudden stirring at the gates of Vasser Vitae only spurred the Frozen Blade more, flinging colorful epithets like arrows. The ragged remains of the Hydronian force appeared, cheering on their king, a tiny figure in the wide mouth of Vitae. The Crystaysian force stood in a defiant semicircle, the General and groups of mockers still shouting in front of its broad curve. Dumarkius rose on the crest of a slow moving wave, its murky water propelling the Rain King forward in an ominous charge. Even coaxed out of his fortress, Dumarkius was still a deadly force to be reckoned with. His approach whipped the Crystalysians into a jeering frenzy, till I could feel the Hydronian leader’s ire rising. Though still at a distance, the Rain King fired a spiraling jet of water from his watery steed. Azure beams from the palms of mages attempted to freeze the attack, but its current was too powerful. The mockers braced themselves, shields upraised, but the water jet shattered their defense, sending the warriors and mages alike sprawling. A second jet silenced the other set of revilers, their icy barrier affording little protection against Dumarkius’s onslaught. Now only General Sammei was left, shaking her balled fist in contempt.
Shouting a warrior’s cry, she charged the King, the Frozen Edge uplifted. Mid-leap she was caught in the vice grip of two enormous swirling hands that had rose instantaneously from Dumarkius’s wave. The Rain King mimicked grasping with his outstretched hands and their liquid counterparts squeezed until her body snapped painfully straight, like a soldier at attention. The pressure increased until the cracking of her bones caused all the warriors of the Frozen Blade to wince. She was tossed like a rag doll to the sodden reeds where she lay in an unmoving heap
Hopping lightly from his perch, Dumarkius laughed heartily at the remaining Crystalysian forces, fear evident in their eyes. The wave remained suspended behind him, a foreboding backdrop for the Hydronian tyrant.
“Pathetic Crysters!” He railed, booming voice causing the water to ripple, “Are insults your only weapons? Look before you! All who oppose me are crushed. Everyone who rises against me has fallen, for I am…”
“Everyone, but me,” I chimed in, stepping out from behind the semicircle of soldiers. One of the Crystalysian warriors had been kind enough to lend me a spear, which was the only thing propping up my wearied body. I prayed to Shaddai that Dumarkius would be too blinded by rage to notice, “Before you break into another of your grandiose monologues, why don’t you, O Soggy King, tell everyone how a mere jester has ousted you, not once but twice. Please let them all know how the great King of Drizzle, in all of his puissant splendor, could not vanquish what should be a mere fly on his wall? I’ll tell you! It’s because this self-proclaimed Sea God is nothing more than an impotent, waterlogged buffoon! Go fetch me a drink, Lord of the Puddle, I thirst!”
Dumarkius’s rage was palatable. He worked his jaw open several times, but no words were uttered. With the First Shard blazing like a morning star, the Rain King sounded a charge and the water obeyed. Spiraling in a relentless torrent, the once suspended wave now arced over its master, hurtling full force in my direction. I released my support, toppling face first into the muck and the soldiers behind me did likewise. Hidden behind the soldiers was another troop of mages with far different directives than the mockers. They quickly sculpted a gutter of ice from the mucky water. Tracing the trajectory of the torrential jet, they gradually arced the structure, channeling the water so it blasted back at the Rain King. Dumarkius, in his anger, had made the attack so forceful that even he could not stop it, deflecting the turbulent jet off to his right.
It was then that my plan began to unfold as another troop of Crystalysian elementalists emerged from their cover of reeds behind Dumarkius, erecting another frozen culvert. The wild jet spun again towards its originator who struggled to divert the flow. A third group revealed themselves, repeating the strategy. As the Hydronian leader attempted to slow his projectile, the semicircle converged, all of the soldiers dragging their overturned helmets in the watery sludge. Flinging the contents of their headgear at the Rain King, the soldiers stepped aside to the elementalists, whose spells froze the slow moving water and muck alike into a glistening dome with Dumarkius trapped inside. The real Sammei also emerged from the underbrush, driving her blade into the ground to freeze the muck around the base of Dumarkius’s icy prison solid. The fallen General was merely an icy construct, animated like a puppet by the mages and cloaked in one of my illusions.
The soldiers scooped up more water in their makeshift buckets, fueling the elementalists as they ensured that the Rain King’s cage would be a thick one. The rest of the soldiers wiped the anxiety off their brows and cheered, but Sammei did not share in their revelry.
“How long will it hold him?” she asked me gravely
“Well, his magic is limited without a source to manipulate. However his Water Form is far more advanced than I could have realized. You have a few days at most. Your only option is to take Vitae while I fetch the queen. He cannot effectively siege our forces from within its walls. The remaining Hydronian guard will be easily cowed without their King to lead them. Dumarkius will be forced to bring his armies back from the front lines. Hopefully Ella will be here before that happens.”
“Let it be done, Pollo,” Sammei said, gesturing to where the mounts had been hidden, “I’ll be damned if I let a Lord of the Puddle have victory over the Frozen Blade.”
As I fell, the world fell with me. All stone and ice, wind and water. We all plummeted into the yawning nothing; the unyielding city below our only destination. The bronze bell was the only one of us who would not be intimidated by this beast of a city. It made its presence known, a resounding gong as it crashed heavily into one of Vasser Vitae’s stony arches. Despite is fine masonry crumbling, the arch itself held under the bell’s tremendous weight, the bronze giant anchored firmly in its cracked foundation. I swung helplessly like a pendulum from the bell’s rope, my arms threatening to tear loose from their sockets. My weak grasp could no longer maintain its grip on the rope and I fell into a half frozen over basin.
The icy water clamped down on my chest like a vice, forcing precious air out of my mouth in a bubbling geyser. My back ached from the ice shattering entry, but I pushed back the pain, the last of my focus and strength expended on clawing my way to the surface. Sputtering as I broke through the freezing reserve, I weakly flopped my arms over the rim of the basin. The bronze bell, though now silent, still rung in my ears muffling the sounds of a crossbow
I called out to the crossbow man, but my voice was a raspy phantom, barely escaping my bruised throat. Sammei had to be informed and sound a retreat. Any other fighting in the city would just be suicide to the Crystalysians. Fortunately the archer’s trained eye was enough to spot me, and before shouting something indistinct to his companions, he rushed over to my side. Hauling me up by the scruff of my uniform, the marksman flopped me over his shoulder, swiftly carrying me away from the turmoil that still roiled about the fortress.
“Retreat…” I croaked, “We must…sound the retreat”
“You daft fool!” came the bubbly and familiar voice of Javanelle, giving my damp head a friendly knuckle “We all saw what happened up there, and those that didn’t see certainly heard. Sammei has already blown retreat, but she’ll sure as snow not be pleased about it.”
Dodging expertly through the streets of the city, Javanelle wound her way back to the gate, the remains of the Frozen Blade’s icy ramp shining like monuments to the fallen heroes strewn about it. Streams of Crystalysian forces joined her, all converging at the gate. Some carried their wounded compatriots, others cast wary glances back to the fortress, fear on their faces. Rushing as one out of the gate, Sammei was clearly in sight, sitting upright on her stretcher, propped up by a comical collection of odd sized pillows. Her face was anything but comical as she frowned at companies as they began to form ragged rows behind her.
By this time, Javanelle had lowered me to the ground, supporting my weight with my arm slung across her shoulders. No doubt she hoped that the General would not see my incredible weakness. Sammei would not be fooled.
“I do believe I’m beginning to understand you, jester,” Sammei’s withering look wasting away all the defenses I had left, “It would appear that whenever I have things in hand, something drastic and devastating appears. I know, deep down, somewhere, that you are solely responsible. Since unfortunately you managed to survive whatever display of idiocy I just witnessed on that roof, I can’t begin to hope that Vasser Vitae is securely in our hands?”
“Whether by his paradoxically keen mind or his super inflated ego, the Rain King did not march with his forces to Pyria,” I rasped out, squirming uncomfortably under the General’s glare, “Also, I have no doubt that he survived that blast. A shard wielder inside the city, with as much water as the Western Sea can give at his disposal; we’d be as good as dead. Challenge his ego and he will leave Vitae to crush your audacity. Our only chance of survival is delaying Dumarkius and bringing a combatant of similar caliber. The only way to fight a shard wielder is with another shard wielder.”
“You wish to bring our Lady to the battlefield?” sputtered Javanelle, almost dropping me with her befuddlement, “The queen has never left the castle for any wars!”
“Well if ‘Our Lady’ doesn’t wish for her armies to be decimated, she will have to come to our aid. Dumarkius is a pompous tyrant, but he’s no fool. His ambition has always fueled his persistence and now he has the clout to back it up. But we must act now.”
“Tell us, Jester, and we’ll do it,” piped a blond elementalist, the crumpled body of an elder mage cradled in arms. I recognized the blanched face as one who had been the first to cross into the city with me, victims to the Dense Water bombardment. Though the youth was soaked through and through, one could still trace the tracts of tears on his ruddy face. “This man taught me more than my art. He taught me what it meant to be a son. Is our Queen losing fathers? Brothers? Sons or daughters?”
I nodded slowly, watching Sammei’s face transform from a scowl to a terse line. Arms crossed across her chest, the General scanned the faces of the warriors under her command. Turning lastly to me, she replied “Very well, Pollo. Lead us onward.”
The night rang with insults of all flavors, including some in other languages, all reviling the Rain King. Come dawn, Sammei voice carried above the rest, invoking such lewd and crass taunts that even some of the soldiers around her blushed. Sudden stirring at the gates of Vasser Vitae only spurred the Frozen Blade more, flinging colorful epithets like arrows. The ragged remains of the Hydronian force appeared, cheering on their king, a tiny figure in the wide mouth of Vitae. The Crystaysian force stood in a defiant semicircle, the General and groups of mockers still shouting in front of its broad curve. Dumarkius rose on the crest of a slow moving wave, its murky water propelling the Rain King forward in an ominous charge. Even coaxed out of his fortress, Dumarkius was still a deadly force to be reckoned with. His approach whipped the Crystalysians into a jeering frenzy, till I could feel the Hydronian leader’s ire rising. Though still at a distance, the Rain King fired a spiraling jet of water from his watery steed. Azure beams from the palms of mages attempted to freeze the attack, but its current was too powerful. The mockers braced themselves, shields upraised, but the water jet shattered their defense, sending the warriors and mages alike sprawling. A second jet silenced the other set of revilers, their icy barrier affording little protection against Dumarkius’s onslaught. Now only General Sammei was left, shaking her balled fist in contempt.
Shouting a warrior’s cry, she charged the King, the Frozen Edge uplifted. Mid-leap she was caught in the vice grip of two enormous swirling hands that had rose instantaneously from Dumarkius’s wave. The Rain King mimicked grasping with his outstretched hands and their liquid counterparts squeezed until her body snapped painfully straight, like a soldier at attention. The pressure increased until the cracking of her bones caused all the warriors of the Frozen Blade to wince. She was tossed like a rag doll to the sodden reeds where she lay in an unmoving heap
Hopping lightly from his perch, Dumarkius laughed heartily at the remaining Crystalysian forces, fear evident in their eyes. The wave remained suspended behind him, a foreboding backdrop for the Hydronian tyrant.
“Pathetic Crysters!” He railed, booming voice causing the water to ripple, “Are insults your only weapons? Look before you! All who oppose me are crushed. Everyone who rises against me has fallen, for I am…”
“Everyone, but me,” I chimed in, stepping out from behind the semicircle of soldiers. One of the Crystalysian warriors had been kind enough to lend me a spear, which was the only thing propping up my wearied body. I prayed to Shaddai that Dumarkius would be too blinded by rage to notice, “Before you break into another of your grandiose monologues, why don’t you, O Soggy King, tell everyone how a mere jester has ousted you, not once but twice. Please let them all know how the great King of Drizzle, in all of his puissant splendor, could not vanquish what should be a mere fly on his wall? I’ll tell you! It’s because this self-proclaimed Sea God is nothing more than an impotent, waterlogged buffoon! Go fetch me a drink, Lord of the Puddle, I thirst!”
Dumarkius’s rage was palatable. He worked his jaw open several times, but no words were uttered. With the First Shard blazing like a morning star, the Rain King sounded a charge and the water obeyed. Spiraling in a relentless torrent, the once suspended wave now arced over its master, hurtling full force in my direction. I released my support, toppling face first into the muck and the soldiers behind me did likewise. Hidden behind the soldiers was another troop of mages with far different directives than the mockers. They quickly sculpted a gutter of ice from the mucky water. Tracing the trajectory of the torrential jet, they gradually arced the structure, channeling the water so it blasted back at the Rain King. Dumarkius, in his anger, had made the attack so forceful that even he could not stop it, deflecting the turbulent jet off to his right.
It was then that my plan began to unfold as another troop of Crystalysian elementalists emerged from their cover of reeds behind Dumarkius, erecting another frozen culvert. The wild jet spun again towards its originator who struggled to divert the flow. A third group revealed themselves, repeating the strategy. As the Hydronian leader attempted to slow his projectile, the semicircle converged, all of the soldiers dragging their overturned helmets in the watery sludge. Flinging the contents of their headgear at the Rain King, the soldiers stepped aside to the elementalists, whose spells froze the slow moving water and muck alike into a glistening dome with Dumarkius trapped inside. The real Sammei also emerged from the underbrush, driving her blade into the ground to freeze the muck around the base of Dumarkius’s icy prison solid. The fallen General was merely an icy construct, animated like a puppet by the mages and cloaked in one of my illusions.
The soldiers scooped up more water in their makeshift buckets, fueling the elementalists as they ensured that the Rain King’s cage would be a thick one. The rest of the soldiers wiped the anxiety off their brows and cheered, but Sammei did not share in their revelry.
“How long will it hold him?” she asked me gravely
“Well, his magic is limited without a source to manipulate. However his Water Form is far more advanced than I could have realized. You have a few days at most. Your only option is to take Vitae while I fetch the queen. He cannot effectively siege our forces from within its walls. The remaining Hydronian guard will be easily cowed without their King to lead them. Dumarkius will be forced to bring his armies back from the front lines. Hopefully Ella will be here before that happens.”
“Let it be done, Pollo,” Sammei said, gesturing to where the mounts had been hidden, “I’ll be damned if I let a Lord of the Puddle have victory over the Frozen Blade.”