Millennial Mage

Tala and Rane stood close, Terry at their back as Tala regarded Anatalis with budding hope. “Great Anatalis, could you fix our issue with a boon? If so, we would move the Doman-Imithe and Zeme itself to earn such from you.”

The wolf let out a deep, almost dramatic sigh. “You haven’t been able to conceive, have you? That is the issue of which you speak.”

“No.” Rane was the one who answered, “We can tell you what we know, if that would help to—”

The wolf shook his head. “There is no need. I can already see the obvious issue. I don’t see you being able to conceive a mortal child, and humans can’t birth immortals.”

That tickled something in Tala’s scrabbling mind, and she latched onto it. “But you are a specialist in birthing immortals.” She gestured to the surrounding wolves. “That’s what you and great Vidarra do, and have done, for every one of your children.”

“That is true, but just because a bird lays eggs that does not mean she can teach an elephant to do the same, and sitting on a nest does not make an elephant into a bird.” He chuckled. “Though, such would be quite the sight, indeed.”

Tala felt sadness begin to resurface despite Anatalis’ attempt to lift the mood. “So, not by normal means, then…”

“No, regrettably not.”

“What of a boon?” Rane had spoken up once again.

“You could earn a boon, and that would allow something. In truth, the answer would be yes, but no. I implore you to not take this route. A boon from nearly any being of my advancement could make such possible. It would be a much smaller thing for myself and my Vidarra than for most others, in fact. But, to do so would fundamentally change who Tala is, and not in a good way. It would likely alter Rane as well. On the other side, if we locked you both as you are, preventing alterations to your bodies and souls while finding another path for an immortal child to be born, such a boon would so mangle any child that they would have no place in human society, or anywhere else that I know of. Even your little village would not be able to keep them.”“How can that be true?” Tala tried to grab onto the potential for hope. “It is my town, how could my child be unwelcome?”

“Can you imagine each of the magical or arcanous creatures you’ve encountered in your town? Or are there some that wouldn’t mesh well?”

“Well… of course some don’t fit, but most of them that wouldn’t…” Her eyes widened. “Magical beasts you said? But my town is mostly gateless.”

“And do magical beasts ignore arcanes?”

Rane was frowning. “Is he saying that any viable child, as allowed by a boon, would be a Magical creature?”

Tala frowned. “I think he’s using that as an analogy.”

“A bit of both. That is one way that a child could be possible, but a human born as a magical beast would be fundamentally different from your mundane stock. It would feel an instinctual revulsion toward all gated, including the two of you. It would likely become a champion of the arcanes, even while it despised them almost as much. It’s hard to tell, though. There are almost no sapient magical beasts, and any child born with such a change would decidely be that.”

Her frown deepened. “Aren’t you all exactly that? Isn’t the Pack made up of sapient magical beings?”

Anatalis chuckled even as many of the wolves growled in clear offense. “Silence, pups. She is asking a genuine question, not seeking to offend. I was such long ago, but the heights of power are a broad plateau where many of the distinctions fade. My sirelings—my Pack—are born bound to me and my Vidarra—they are never bound to any portion of Zeme. Beyond that, I will not say.”

“So, there’s no hope… If even a boon cannot accomplish it, it is impossible.” Tala felt herself wilting. Up until this point, she’d had some vague hope that they’d find a solution.

But, before she could sink too far, Anatalis huffed a derisive snort. “Can you access the Archive?”

Tala tilted her head to the side. “Yes?”

“Yet a boon cannot gain you the same, if you lack access. Therefore, it must be impossible, right?”

It only took a moment’s thought for the building pressure in her chest to loosen slightly. “So, it is possible for us to have children?”

He gave a lupine shrug. “I honestly do not know. I simply wished to remind you that boons are not cure-alls, nor is a problem they cannot address unfixable. The stories make much of boons, but they are, at their basic level, just an Existence enforced ‘best effort’ from a being of power. Don’t forget that.”

That wasn’t really that helpful. It didn’t give her an answer, or even any idea on where to search in order to find one, but for some reason she did feel some relief.

There was another minute of silence before Terry trilled at the sky, flickered to Tala’s shoulder to headbutt her, then flickered back away and trilled again.

Tala got the message. ‘Let’s distract ourselves with something we can actually do something about at the moment.’

She laughed before she realized it, Terry’s actions already doing as he’d intended. “Fine, Terry. You can fight someone.”

Anatalis faded away once more, and a moment later, a larger, brown-furred wolf jumped down into the arena.

She was nearly half-again as large as the sireling was. That wolf was now up on the cliff, laying down to watch the proceedings with the rest of the Pack who were present at the moment.

Rane placed his hand on Tala’s shoulder. “Shall we get out of his way? He’s apparently been practicing to a rather extreme degree. Terry has been without a sparring partner—other than us—for much, much too long.”

Neither of them saw the Talons as counting in that regard, given they gave no real difficulty to him.

She looked up at Rane, then gave a slow nod. “Yeah, let’s see what he’s capable of.” She turned to give Terry an encouraging glance. “Show them what a Sappherrous can do. Eh, Terry?”

Terry fluffed himself up a bit, then screeched to the sky, the sound more basso than such sounds usually were.

Rane laughed at the avian’s antics—even though he still had a tinge of sadness about him from the previous topic—before he and Tala moved up to the cliff top, each utilizing a powerful leap to land lightly in the space left clear for them.

“With no inscriptions to be suppressed, you may each clash as you are.”

The she-wolf tilted her head to the side, exposing her neck to Terry in a brief show of respect. “To the death?”

Her words were barely distinguishable from that of a human, despite her lupine mouth.

“Or if either of you are able to throw the other from the arena.”

The she-wolf seemed unhappy, but she acknowledged.

Terry chirped firmly in response, confirming his agreement.

Tala felt a tightness building in her gut, even though she knew that she could bring Terry back even if the worst should happen.

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“Begin.”

Tala watched as Terry immediately flickered forward, shrinking down just enough to easily fit under the she-wolf’s head. He also appeared upside-down, midair, already slashing at her throat, his talons aspect-mirroring the hollow, cutting power of the void through his soulbound to Tala.

The swiftness and ferocity of the attack took even Tala off guard for a moment, and it seemed that the wolf was even more surprised.

There was no testing, no probing, no analysis or steadily increasing power behind escalating attacks.

Terry’s intention was obviously to use an instantly lethal, quick strike, and the slash should have been that.

Rust, it nearly was.

But the Pack hadn’t survived for millenia by being easily overcome. The wolf forged magics for her use as Terry appeared and struck out, despite her own, obvious surprise.

His talons cut deeply into her neck before the defenses came into play, and even then they were a simple blast of air, which just knocked Terry backward—he likely didn’t flicker away as he was in the middle of a rather effective attack—doing him no harm at all.

His talons were ripped outward by the hit, but he’d still landed a devastating blow.

He flickered away, out of the line of the air blast, as soon as his talons were no longer in flesh and before he touched the ground once more.

He left behind a ragged gash that was unnaturally bloodless for an instant, before a torrent gushed outward.

She staggered, more natural magics coming into effect by the second. The effect was like someone pouring buckets of glowing paint over the wolf, but with far, far greater detail in the rushing power. This being was a master at quick magical manipulation. Even so, Terry flickered back in.

He was countered with armored fur, licks of lightning, blasts of air or water, and innumerable other little workings, each designed to be just threatening enough to force him to flicker away rather than trading blows.

As she staved him off, she also built magics that knit her flesh back together. It was a clear delaying tactic so she could recover the lead he’d grabbed at the start.

Rumbles of approval went around the arena, through the watching wolves. Though, Tala couldn’t actually tell if it was for Terry’s opening strike or the wolf’s ability to hold him off and recover.

To Tala’s magesight, her own aura—as projected by Terry—clashed yellow, past chartreuse toward green, against the greenish blue, a good way past teal, of the wolf he was facing.

He was fighting against someone nearly an entire grade of advancement higher than himself.

But then, Terry was used to fighting those more advanced than himself.

He’d been doing it quite nearly his whole life.

Rust, essentially all of his clashes against Tala—until recently—had been him fighting up grades. The only exception was his first attack on her, way back on her first caravan trip.

Tala felt a smile tug at her lips at the memory. She also felt a twinge in her arm and back at the meticulously remembered pain. The curse of perfect memory.

-Indeed. I’ve never felt pain directly, but your memories let me know that it is awful. I am so glad you don’t want to switch places.-

Focusing back on the clash, it was evident that the two fighters were well matched. Terry’s initial surprise attack was the only blood drawn as the clash continued.

The wolf attempted to weave spellforms of dimensional denial—obviously to keep Terry from teleporting—but he somehow breached each and every one with laughable ease.

He even actually let out laugh-like trills on many occasions, seeming to revel in his mastery, even as the she-wolf began to growl in increasing irritation.

I doubt Mistress Cethira could stop him now.

-Indeed, I suspect it would take Kit or Vidarra to truly lock him in place.-

You know what? We haven’t actually tried to do that within Kit. It might be an interesting test.

-...Maybe…-

She could use her soulbond with the avian to keep him from flickering, at least in theory, but she was not keen to try that. It felt like it would be a betrayal of trust in some deep manner.

Tala put that from her mind and returned her focus to the fight.

The she-wolf had laced some power that Tala didn’t recognize through her own fur, and it seemed to directly counter the void-edge that Terry aspect-mirrored onto his talons, but Terry didn’t seem deterred.

If the fight had to be ‘called,’ Terry would be named the winner because of that first strike, but it would have been a hollow victory.

The avian seemed to agree with Tala’s assessment, because, finally, he trilled at the sky, allowing his opponent to send out a fully formed column of fire at him.

He flickered out of the way, appearing in what was likely his largest possible form. He stood some thirty feet tall at the shoulder, filling up a good chunk of the arena.

He shrieked down at the wolf, and the sound was like a sonic attack, causing even all the watching lupines to flinch back, whine, and cover their ears with their paws, seemingly on reflex.

Tala and Rane winced, but much of the sound was out of their range of hearing, both too low and too high in its overlapping resonance.

The she-wolf fighting Terry was affected the most, clearly utterly dazed by the shriek.

In that moment of disorientation that he’d been able to cause, Terry slammed his whole foot down on the wolf, driving her to the ground on her side and pinning her in place.

He then struck down with his beak, slamming into her head once, twice, three times.

He then shrunk even as he rolled to the side, toward the sheer drop on the open side of the arena.

He kept enough size to be able to leverage the broken and bleeding wolf, using his momentum to hurtle her over the edge.

She let out a startled, whining yip that was cut off by grinding, crunching, splintering sounds as her body met the trees below.

Tala wasn’t sure which had come out better, the trees or the wolf, but regardless, the wolves seemed to have decided that the match was over, as the she-wolf had been sent from the ring.

The watching Pack howled even as Anatalis faded into being beside the now much smaller Terry.

“Well fought, avian. Your age and wisdom shows against our fourth youngest member. I may have to reconsider how we raise our sirelings, in light of the showing you and yours have given. She was your elder by nearly half a century and your superior in advancement by nearly a full step, yet you won through hard earned skill, instinct, and exceptional timing.”

Terry fluffed his feathers, preening under the praise.

“You should be aware, however, she was not killed, and she would have come back with a vengeance that I don’t believe you would have survived, had this been a real clash. Her advancement is simply too far greater than yours, for your victory to be lasting.” Anatalis’ lupine grin showed a field of teeth.

Terry chirped a few times, and Tala smiled. He doesn’t mind that. He won the fight they were having. The fact that he would have lost a different fight is of no consequence.

-That’s… reading a lot into a few chirps?-

Am I wrong?

-I don’t think so… huh. Soulbonds are weird sometimes.-

True, but in this case, I think it’s just Terry. We do know him rather well, and we’ve always been able to hear his intention in his chirps, squawks, and trills.

-True enough, I suppose.-

Terry flickered to Rane’s shoulder, headbutting the man’s cheek before flickering to Tala’s and doing the same, only then settling in on her shoulder even as she remained sitting on the top of the cliff.

“Truly, we have rarely had such an accomplished pack visit us peaceably. Be thrice welcomed and be at peace.”

A shiver ran through Tala’s very soul, something in the words having a power and meaning beyond her understanding. She also had a moment of belated fear, realizing that she had not had that assurance—nor promise of peace—from Anatalis even a minute before then.

I should ask Lisa, if he’s willing to share his wisdom and knowledge. I’m sure it’s critical in some manner.

-It did have the sound of ceremony, didn’t it.- It wasn’t really a question.

Tala and Rane both gave measured bows, and Terry chirped and fluffed his feathers again, holding onto Tala’s shoulder even as she moved.

“Now, we shall celebrate your presence with a feast.”

She glanced toward her husband. Well, Terry will be ecstatic, and I suppose we can eat raw meat well enough…

Anatalis chuckled, deep and menacingly one more, seemingly understanding her hesitations. “We are aware of human preferences for food, and we would be poor hosts indeed if we did not accommodate your peculiarities.”

They bowed once again, accepting the offered kindness.

“You have… many with you as well. Some of them would be welcome to join us, if you desire. If you please, no more than one hundred, or I fear we would be overrun with your kind. While that would be of no consequence in a battle, in a peaceful meal, I believe it would be overmuch.”

Rane looked her way, Enar and Alat facilitating a speed-of-thought communication. “Should we invite Lyn, Lisa, Master Simon, Mistress Petra, Brandon, Kedva, Adrill, Ron, and some of the more senior others?”

“That sounds like a good list to me.”

“-On it.-”

“Thank you, Alat.”

A moment later, Tala bowed toward Anatalis. “We accept, and will be inviting thirty-nine humans and one arcane, if it pleases you.”

Somehow, Anatalis’ grin grew even larger. “So shall it be. Long has it been since Lisa graced the Lunar Hunt. If he accepts, a… word with that fox is always enjoyable.”

Lisa refused the invitation with a modicum of courtesy, but everyone else accepted with alacrity.

It was time to feast.