The First Life of Tanan (13 page)

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

Tanan blinked a few times.  There were hundreds of dead Komisani around him.  He was covered with blood and worse.  He was suddenly aware of the pain in his hip and the awful smell of the battlefield.  Figis was saying something he didn’t understand.

The Legion Commander was thirty yards away, staring at him.  Tanan stepped around Figis and walked toward the Commander, who started to back away slowly.  The fighting was done.  Injured men were making sounds that Tanan had never heard.  Komisani were fleeing the valley.  They had never faced an enemy who could fight back.

“What is your name?” asked Tanan as he walked toward the Commander.

“I am Brakkas, Commander of the King’s Legion,” said the man, mustering his courage.  He saw what this boy had done and he knew he was about to die.  He wouldn’t die whimpering like a coward.

Tanan stopped ten feet from the man. “My name is Abbot Tanan.”

Tanan looked out across the battlefield and gestured toward a large area where there were no bodies, living or dead.  When Brakkas looked to where Tanan was pointing, Tanan caused an immense ball of flame to erupt on the faraway spot.  It produced a sound like a lightning strike and sent a gust of hot air washing past them.

Brakkas looked at Tanan and waited for the fire that would consume him.

“Carry this message to your King.  Tell him that Tanan, son of Anin, grandson of Lindelin, and Master of the five schools of magic commands him to recall his soldiers.  Tell Dannap that if he fails to obey my command, if I discover even a single Komisani has left your island, I will come to Komisan.  I will walk into his palace and I will turn him to ash.  Repeat what I said.”

“Y-you are Tanan,” the man stammered.  “Son of Anin, grandson of Lindelin and Master of the f-five schools of magic.”  Brakkas repeated the message back.

Tanan pointed to the East, where the Komisani had entered the valley just an hour before.  “Leave this place.”

And then Tanan turned his back on Commander Brakkas and walked away.

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

Tanan and Figis walked around the valley, visiting every area that had been effected by the battle.  One of the Abbots they spoke with noticed Tanan’s wound and insisted on healing him.

The battle had taken place primarily in a large field on the East end of the valley, but small groups of Komisani had also attacked from the sides and from behind.  Figis organized a group of Abbots and farmers to start digging a mass grave on the far east end of the valley.  Tanan and a few other healers started searching for wounded survivors.

There were a lot of dead, but thanks to the fire globes, most of them were Komisani.  One of the Abbots Tanan was working with found a Legionnaire who was badly burned, but still alive.  Tanan had never healed more than a minor wound, but he tried to heal the man.  He harnessed energy from the air around him and put it into the most powerful healing spell he knew, laying his hands on the soldier’s body and chanting.  The man’s wounds were too severe and Tanan wasn’t able to heal him, so he did what he could to numb the man’s pain and stayed with him until he died.

In all, they found twenty-three Komisani that they were able to heal.  They sent the men out of the valley as a group, giving them the same message that Tanan had given to Brakkas.

By the end of the day there were twenty-four Abbots that were either confirmed dead, or could not be found and were assumed dead.  Soama was among them.  Some Abbots had been caught in the radius of the fire globes, and there were so many bodies that were burned down to black bones that they couldn’t be identified.

Over the next several days, the men and women of the Jesera Valley dug graves.  Seventeen for the Abbots and farmers who had died, and one mass grave for the remains of the Komisani.  The seven missing Abbots were given funerals, and markers were placed even though there were no bodies to bury.  The mass grave was filled in and marked with a circle of stones.

Nobody in the valley came through the battle without losing someone they cared about, and they all grieved for those they had lost.

•        •        •

A month after the battle, spring was in full bloom and the valley was greening up.  It was sunny and warm.  Gardens and fields were being planted and people were beginning to recover from the emotional drain of the battle.  The new graveyard, just west of the tower, was being heavily seeded with flowers.

The Abbots were sending out patrols to insure that the Komisani were gone.  There was no sign of them within a week’s walk in any direction.  Once planting was done, they would send a group of Abbots to check along the coast to be sure that the Komisani had indeed left the mainland.  Everyone in Jesera desperately wanted the war with Komisan to be over, but they would be vigilant.

Another Abbot moved into Soama’s house and Tanan took Soama’s books and some of his other possessions.  After Anin had been killed, the house felt empty.  Tanan spent most of his time out of the house helping rebuild the damage that was done during the battle.

Tanan completely tore up the area of the walkway where his father had been killed.  He dug a ten yard wide pond on that spot and rebuilt the path, splitting it so that it wrapped around each side of the pond and continued on the other side.  He carried pink and white water lilies from the far west end of the lake and transplanted them in the pond.

When there was no more repair work to be done, Tanan started working on his book about offensive magic.  He agreed with Figis that the book needed to be written, so he would spend a few hours each morning at the far west end of the valley practicing and perfecting offensive spells.  Then he spent time each afternoon writing down what he learned.

He knew that his actions had saved Jesera, and he had been thanked for what he’d done by a hundred people, most notably Gowrand, who went out of his way to tell him that he had done the right thing.  Tanan didn’t feel bad about what he’d done, but he never wanted to have to kill like that again.

CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

Four months after the battle at Jesera, a group of Abbots arrived from the monastery on the northern edge of the great desert.  They had travelled through the eastern Lataki plains and spoken with several Lataki tribes along the way.  The news they brought was disturbing.

The Komisani, while avoiding the northern and western plains, were actively hunting down and killing Lataki in the east.  The Lataki, with their spears and animal hide clothing were no match for the Komisani, who had steel armor and weapons.  The Lataki had no chance.

Tanan heard the news from Gowrand, who said that he wasn’t surprised at the actions of the Komisani and was afraid more drastic actions might have to be taken.  Tanan went directly to the newly arrived Abbots and heard the information first hand.  Then he went to his house and packed up his things.  He took his book of research to Figis, along with a few personal items, and asked the old Abbot to store them until he returned.

Figis tried to persuade Tanan to stay, but he knew that his arguments were falling on deaf ears.  He agreed to store Tanan’s things and urged his favorite student to exercise good judgment when dealing with the Komisani.

He stopped to see his friend Cartos, who was the unofficial map maker at the monastery.  Cartos gave Tanan a copy of a map of the Lataki plains, asking Tanan to improve it if he could.

Tanan left the valley where he had lived for so many years.  He had come to Jesera an angry eleven year old boy.  Now he was nearly twenty and a Master of the five schools of magic.  He was still angry, but it wasn’t the vengeful anger he’d carried as a child.  Now he was angry because he knew he had to do something terrible, and he didn’t want to do it.  But it was something no other person in the world could do.  He had to find the Komisani army and kill them.  And then, he had to pay a visit to King Dannap and make good on his promise.

CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

The Lataki plains were vast and Tanan had to walk the length of them.  The journey would take weeks.

He decided to spend his time in the emptiness of the grasslands experimenting with magic.  As Tanan walked, he gathered energy from the air.  Rather than drawing it into himself as he usually did, he attempted to focus the raw energy on a spot yards in front of himself.

When he gathered the energy into himself, he could feel it building.  He could feel the accumulation of power.  Focusing the energy outside his body wasn’t difficult, but it was hard to measure.  When it was building inside his body, there were specific physical sensations.  When he built energy outside his body, it was more like hearing a distant echo.

Several times while drawing energy together in front of himself, the hair on his arms began to stand up.  It was an odd, tingly sensation.  When he reached his hand out toward his ball of energy there was a loud pop and he was knocked off his feet by the static shock.  He was glad nobody had been around to see that.

Tanan decided he wouldn’t do that again.  After the jitters wore off, he decided to try and gather the energy farther away.  He was walking through gently rolling hills, and picked out the top of a hill about a quarter of a mile in front of him.  He willed the energy to gather a hundred feet above the hill.  From that distance, he couldn’t gauge the amount of energy he was building, or if it was even working.  He just kept gathering and sending more and more energy as he walked.

When he got to about a hundred yards from the top of the hill, he stopped.  He could feel the faintest echo of the energy, but he wasn’t sure what to do with it.  As he stood and pondered his options, a bolt of lightening struck the top of the hill.  He jumped, and his heart raced.  The sky was clear and blue.  The lightning struck right below where his ball of energy had been.  There was no way that was a coincidence.

He climbed to the top of the hill and looked at the scorched spot of earth where the lightning had touched the earth.  Tanan started walking again and spent the rest of the afternoon practicing his new trick.

•        •        •

Evening brought an overcast sky and a clear threat of rain.  Tanan stopped at the top of a hill and set up his tent.  When it started to sprinkle, he sat inside and erected a large protective bubble around his camp.  He ate strips of dried meat and watched the rain run down the dome of his bubble, as if it were made of glass.  The full moon broke through the clouds, sending fingers of light that danced across over the plains.  Tanan had never seen anything like it.  It was beautiful.

Somewhere out on the plains, there was an army of Komisani.  This rain would wash away the Lataki blood they were spilling.  Nature would take back the bodies of the dead.  But the blood on the hands of the Komisani, that would never wash off.

Tanan closed his eyes and spent the night in deep meditation, trying not to think about what he had to do.

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

Tanan had been walking for weeks, always keeping the river to his left.  He was looking for a house built near the river.  Figis had said to be sure and make a stop at the house to visit a retired Abbot named Ohlara, who lived in seclusion out on the plains.

He had been making fast progress by using his magic to replenish the energy he used and spending his nights meditating to further repair and rejuvenate his body.  He’d walked nonstop starting when it was light enough to see, and stopping only when it got dark.

It was late in the morning when Tanan passed through a stand of trees and found himself standing at the top of a long hill covered with tiny blue flowers.  At the bottom of the hill was a small stone house with a thatched roof.  It had to be Ohlara’s home.

Tanan started down the hill, looking forward to meeting Ohlara.  After weeks alone on the plains, he was eager for human company.  Tanan had a nice view of the house from the hill.  It was a stone house with a thatched roof and it looked like it was well maintained.  The house was about fifty yards off the river.  There was a cobbled path leading from the river up to the house.  Near the house, the path widened into a patio that wrapped around the house.

Behind the house was a large garden with rows of vegetables.  Next to the garden was a sturdy looking pig pen containing a single pig that was watching Tanan walk down the hill and grunting his disapproval.

All of this was surrounded by a bright blue picket fence.  The fence formed a huge circle and the house was right in the center of it.  Tanan followed a narrow dirt path through the flowers.  The path ended at a gate that was spanned by a vine-covered arbor.  Beyond the gate, the path was cobbled.

As Tanan reached the gate, he called out.  “Hello?”  He hadn’t seen anyone as he walked down the hill.  He pushed the gate and it wouldn’t move.  He couldn’t find a latch or a lock.

He shrugged off his pack and sat it next to the gate.  The pig grunted.

“Hello?” he called again.

He walked along the fence, down the hill toward the river.  He could see that the fence didn’t go all the way to the river.  Jumping the fence felt wrong, so he’d just walk around.

As he got closer to the river he saw that the cobbled path from the house led to a wide wooden dock that extended out into the river about twenty feet.  There was a wooden bench  on the dock and someone was sitting on that bench holding a fishing pole.

“Hello!” he yelled.

A tiny old woman stood up from the bench and looked around toward him.

“Hello,” he called again.  “Are you Ohlara?”

The tiny old woman gestured for him to wait and turned back to pull in her fishing line.  She picked up the pole and a wooden bucket and started up the path toward the house.

“I’ll meet you at the gate,” she said.

“Okay,” said Tanan and started walking back along the fence.  He walked slowly, timing it so they would both arrive at the gate at the same time.

Ohlara was a tiny woman with short, mouse-brown hair and two brilliant blue eyes set in her well wrinkled face.  As she walked up to the gate, she smiled broadly and said, “You’re a tall one, aren’t ya?”

“I’m Tanan.  Figis told me that I should stop and see you.  You’re Ohlara, aren’t you?”

She nodded.  “The password for the gate is Exissis.  Come on in.”  Having said the word, she pulled the gate open.

Tanan grabbed his backpack and walked through the gate, ducking slightly to keep his head out of the vines that hung from the top of the arbor.

Ohlara started back down the path and Tanan followed.

“A protective field on the gate,” said Tanan.  “I take it you’re a Master of protective magic?”

“The field surrounds the whole place,” Ohlara said.  “The fence is there to keep anybody from walking into it and getting a bloody nose.”

They reached the house.  There was a lacquered wooden table and chairs on the patio in the shade of the house.  Ohlara motioned for Tanan to sit down as she sat.

“A friend put that field up or me years ago.  The Lataki don’t bother with me, but it keeps out animals.”

She reached down and pulled a fish out of the bucket near her feet.  She put the fish on the table, picked up a knife and started cleaning the fish.  “So you’re Tanan, eh?”  She looked at him for a moment and then went back to her task.

“Yes, Ma’am”

Ohlara had a bowl of water on the table and placed a cleaned fish into it.  “I’ve heard about you.  People tell me you’re a Master of all five branches.  That true?”

“Master of four.  Not sure if anybody is a Master of Offensive magic.”

Ohlara stopped cutting her fish and looked at Tanan.  “If half of what I heard about you is true, if you really beat that Komisan army by yourself I’d say you earned the title.”

Tanan didn’t know why, but he felt chastised.

Ohlara went back to cleaning the fish.  “Too bad that stupid King doesn’t have sense enough to keep to his island.”

“Have you heard anything about the Komisani hunting down Lataki?” asked Tanan.

She nodded.  “The Komisani are afraid of you, boy.  They’re afraid of the Lataki because you’re Lataki.  Seems to me they’re not going to stop until all of you Lataki are dead.”

“I’m going to find that army and stop them,” said Tanan.

Ohlara was finished with the fish and put the last of her filets into the bowl.  She used the knife to slide a pile of fish guts off the table and into the bucket.  She stood and picked up the bucket.  Tanan followed her around the house, through the garden to the pig pen where she dumped the fish guts into a trough.  The pig snorted his thanks for the feast.

She handed the bucket to Tanan.  “Rinse that in the river, would you?”  Tanan was happy to help.

When he walked back up from the river Ohlara was pulling another bucket of water out of the well.  “I’ve never met anyone who knew the right kind of magic to keep flies away,” she said as she dumped the water on the table, washing away the fish blood.  Tanan pulled two more buckets of water out of the well and finished the job for her.

“Thank you,” said Ohlara.  “Now, how about some lunch.”