The Wizard's War (22 page)

“I am much more than fine,” she said, then flounced
away.

“I think my mother is less rude than her,” Sen said
before she got more than a few steps away. Of course, we assumed she didn’t
speak English.

“What a stuck-up, annoying brat,” Drake agreed.

“I think she is my mate,” I sighed. Sen and Drake
both gaped at me while I focused on the curve appeal of the girl walking away.

“Like, your soul mate?” Drake asked. “But I thought…”

“You thought what?” I said when the door shut behind
her.

“Well, you and Hail are never away from each other…
everyone thought you were…” Sen couldn’t finish his sentence.

“What does my brother have to do with Sheena? You
think he won’t like her? It doesn’t matter; I’m never going to see her again.”

“But if she’s your---”

“That’s exactly why I’m never going to see her again.
I don’t want a soul mate. I love my family and that’s quite enough for me.
There is no time or room for anyone else. Even if she does have great… eyes.”
Drake and Sen both walked away, leaving me with Azyle. “What is their problem?”

“I think their hearts are broken.”

“That’s exactly what I’m talking about! God help them
mortals and their bleedin’ hearts. I guess Drake must have gotten in a fight
with his girlfriend and Sen is just lonely.”

“Yes, that must be it,” the Guardian said, walking
away as well.

I sighed. Of course I didn’t want to be alone; I just
couldn’t see any other way. Dad and Mom could work because Dad wouldn’t take
“no” for an answer. Mordon’s mate was destroyed. Until I reached my goal of
becoming the most powerful being in the universe, protecting my family was all
that I could handle.

*          *          *

“I don’t want to be a Guardian.”

“Can I have Samhail?” Vretial asked. We were in the
Land of the Iadnah, in the eccentric god’s favorite place. Actually, I was
asleep in Drake’s bed, but my mind was about to have an argument with my eldest
uncle.

“Samhail is mine. My brother is a protector to the
core of his soul, and he will make a fantastic Guardian. Honestly, you have
been great. I appreciate all of the guidance you have given us.” I took his
hand in both of mine, as I had seen Mom do with Dad. “But you are the second
most powerful force in this world, and you are nearly as great an analyst as my
father.”

“Wait,
nearly
?”

“Oh, yes. I mean, I know he is getting better
constantly while you have reached your potential, but you should still be very
proud.”

He frowned. “Then why do you not want me as your god?
I thought you of all people would refuse to work for anyone but the best.”

“No. Right now, you are a goal to achieve; a role
model. Someday, when I supersede you in power, I might consider you a friend.
However, if I were to work for you, you would instead be an obstacle. And you
don’t want to be an obstacle in my way, I promise you that.”

“An obstacle to what? What is your end goal?”

“The single most powerful force is inside me. For
now, it is a hindrance, which I will learn to control, and once I do, it will
be a tool for me to become the most powerful being in the universe. Maybe I
will even reign over the void.”

“Does your father know of your ambitions?”

I laughed. “He is a healer. He always told me I could
be anything I wanted to be, that I am a good person. I don’t want to hurt
anybody, including you, so I really hope nobody tries to stand in my way.”

“What about your brother?”

“We are each everything and anything the other needs.
My brother will stand by me through anything.”

“And your sister?”

“Alice is a healer, like our father. In fact, she is
identical to him in her soul; the only thing she inherited from our mother is
her appearance. I, on the other hand, am very much like my mother. Fortunately,
the catastrophe that resulted in me could never happen again. And to be
perfectly honest, you should have stopped my mother and father from ever even
meeting.”

“I can’t really figure you out. You are a perfect
combination of your mother and father. You have the power of a god, and
personality of a demon.”

“Huh. I think the humans would call that a devil.”

“Is that what you are? A devil?”

I grinned as I mentally rolled the word over my
tongue. “I don’t know. I like the sound of it, though.”

Divina

Earth was the only world I was responsible for, but
since my Noquodi and I lived on Duran, it was only reasonable that I would do
my part to help Duran. I knew eventually that humans would mature as a race,
but magic would never be widely accepted. That was perfectly fine with me; it
just meant we could never settle permanently on the planet.

Ronez had lived happily on Earth with his magic, but
he wasn’t nearly as powerful as his son, he didn’t have me, and he wasn’t a
doctor. Dylan often told me he never regretted leaving Earth, but I knew he
missed it.

Earth and Duran were thought to be similar by the
gods, that Earth would eventually become just like Duran, but I knew my people
better than that. Humans were nothing like Sago when it came to their
ambitions. If any of my brothers were asked which race would outlast the rest,
each would admit without hesitation that it would be the humans.

I was very proud of my world and my people. Of
course, there were some despicable, horrible humans; every world had a problem
with bad apples. As a god, I loved shaping my world and the people on it, but
since I took a mortal form and made my home on Duran, I slowly distanced myself
from my world. My intention was for my world to be self-sustaining, and my
people never let me down yet. Sure, they made mistakes, but they were like ambitious
little children and couldn’t see the future. They would figure it out
eventually, and Dylan would stop them from getting into too much trouble.

That was, in fact, the reason I found myself on
Zendii. My intention when I visited with Erono was to send Kiro and Dylan, but
my brother told me Kiro was going to Earth to deal with an old enemy of his and
his brother’s. While I thought it was odd, I decided to allow Dylan to go with
him and go to Zendii myself. It occurred to me to have Kiro deal with Zendii
while I helped Dylan on Earth, but I knew Kiro didn’t like to leave unfinished
business behind and I wanted them to have time together like they did before
Dylan became a father.

Although Zendii was not one of my favorite places
because it was all tourists and over-the-top elegance, there were also some
shady towns. Zendii was a place bombarded with culture. I flashed there easily
enough and arrived in a shadowy alley between a bath house and a restaurant.
The fact that Zendii was based on pleasure made it really easy to find my way;
I reached out my magic to find the fear. Successful, my energy came back to me
with the images and direction I needed.

A man was the source of this fear, but it was odd
that my magic didn’t tell me whose fear it was. I sent out my magic again,
specifically to tell me the power this man had, and frowned when it returned.
The man had no magical ability.

So on a world of magic, on a land of luxury and
pleasure, why was there so much fear surrounding him? I walked slowly and confidently
down the dark streets, not looking around or fiddling with anything. Tourists
were pray on Zendii, and this was one of the shady towns. My backpack was safe,
but I didn’t want to draw attention to it.

Men and women worked the streets, trying to draw
customers into their brothels or restaurants. Bath houses were operated at all
hours of the day and night, but the clientele changed drastically at nightfall.
Here, magic was used to seduce and persuade, to lore and trap. This was a place
I made Dylan stay away from because it was against his nature to walk away.
Luckily, it wasn’t against mine. As far as I was concerned, everyone who came
to this place made their choices and would have to live with them.

A sudden sense of forewarning made me step back in
time to avoid being sprayed with glass when the window of a tavern exploded
outward, spilling two wrestling men into the street. A woman inside screamed to
one of the men not to hurt the other and I laughed. People were so funny
sometimes.

I walked around them and was heading away when one of
the men shot an energy bolt at the other. Why did they have to go and make it
not funny? With a sigh, I turned back to the mortals and waved my hands apart,
sending both men back until they were each hanging ten feet apart and suspended
a few feet above the ground. It was almost funny again as they struggled
against unseen forces.

The woman hurried out of the tavern and dived at the
feet of one of the men. I took a moment to observe the situation. One of the
men, the one with the woman weeping at his feet, was considerably younger than
the other and had desperation in his eyes. Although probing his mind with my
magic was easy, understanding the thoughts of mortals was a different matter.
Apparently it was easier for me than for my brothers, but deciphering the
linear thoughts of a three-dimensional creature who perceived life in a
two-dimensional way was usually difficult. Mortals were simple; they saw
progression from point A to point B by direct line.

That was, in fact, the reason I could stop Dylan from
the Sight. Dylan and my son had the ability to see three-dimensionally, but
until they could conceive it, they would never experience it. Until they did, I
could easily shape their futures. Unfortunately, Samhail’s visions were
powerful and specific, where as I saw everything at all points in time.
Usually, Samhail and Ron could have a vision, come up with a plan, and
implement it before I even knew what I saw.

In my mortal form, I typically perceived my environment
with a two-dimensional viewpoint, as all three dimensional beings did, while my
magic acted fourth-dimensional. I may not see through three dimensional objects
as I could when I wanted to, but my magic would and could warn me ahead of time
of danger. I could see a being as they were in my presence, but my magic would
see all points in their timeline, past, present, and future.

What I saw from a person when I wasn’t looking for a
specific event, was everything emotionally significant first, and then everything
in order of how much of an impact the event had on the world around them. While
this man was not actually important, he was desperately in love with this
woman, who shared his passion. Unfortunately for them, the woman’s father
wanted her to marry someone else, and as she was twenty-one, he could force
her.

There were many hundreds of paths to choose from, but
I focused on the most precedent. If she married the man her father wanted her
to, she would be miserable and most likely commit suicide at the age of
twenty-four. The man would also be miserable and most definitely end up offered
to Raktusha, where he would die of illness due to his Kahún blood. I would have
to speak to Vretial about this. Before her almost certain death, the woman
would have a son by her father’s favored. The child would be a magnificent
healer, but would be abused by his father until his father’s unimportant death.

Another path would be for the two in front of me to
marry. Both of them would go to Raktusha and be saved by illness because the
woman had Dios blood in her. Interesting… They would have a daughter who would
marry the leader of a strong political faction… and another man at the same
time. Her people would love and adore her and she would definitely be a great
addition to my brother’s world. Of course, these were just the most likely
paths based on the most plausible decisions. There was another option I could
offer, which would be for the woman to marry neither man, but I didn’t see many
benefits to that choice.

People were easily manipulated, but they followed the
intended plan more when they were happy then when they were miserable. This
woman in particular was prone to suicide and the chance of her ending her own
life if I didn’t help her be with this man was very high. I could easily have
left her alone, since her life meant little to me, but Dylan would be
disappointed in me if he ever found out. Dylan was a healer and never turned
away anyone in need.

The other man I held in my power was the woman’s
father, who cared more about his business than his daughter’s happiness.
Reaching into his mind and manipulating his thought processing was easy. I
could have been more elegant and gentle, but I wasn’t feeling particularly
charitable. Instead, I just made him take more interest in his daughter. He
already knew his daughter was in love and suddenly decided his daughter can
make up her own mind. With this finished, I dropped both men to the ground and
walked away.

I was almost proud that I did something Dylan would
approve of. How sad I had become that my mate’s approval caused me to
manipulate the affairs of individual people? It was the exact kind of thing I
would have done before I took a mortal form, just for fun.

Once I entered the neighborhood, I knew something was
definitely wrong here besides fear. There were no people on the streets, no
music playing from restaurants, and abandoned buildings. In the surrounding
neighborhoods, restaurants left their doors open so that light and sound
spilled out into the dark in attempt to draw in cold and hungry customers. Here
it was quiet, and the fear leached from every person huddling away from the
dark and the solitude.

There was death in the air.

Since the fear was shared by so many, it was
impossible to follow it to a particular spot, so I entered the first tavern I
came to. Duran had alternatives to alcohol which were healthier and shared none
of the negative side effects, but several places still sold it because it was
extremely cheap. Mokii had weak wines, and Zendii provided everything people
could want. This particular tavern had strong, primitive beers, which supported
a customer base of strong, primitive men.

Catcalls greeted me by the men as the door shut out
the cold behind me. Even some of the waitresses gave me appreciative looks as
they went about their duties. I considered turning down the pheromones, but I
wanted cooperation and in a town like this, seduction was the fastest means for
persuasion. Everyone else would be trying to manipulate me as well, which was
amusing to watch.

The tavern was dim, as was the music. Booth tables
lined the walls as tables with chairs filled the rest of the space. There were
bathrooms across from the door, against the opposite wall, and the door to the
kitchen was next to them, which made me shiver. I was a goddess, but I hated
dirtiness. There was a bar to the right of the door, lined with stools. Behind
the bar was a busty woman with rich red hair piled in thick curls on her head,
dotted with sparkling diamonds. Other than in her hair, she wore no jewelry.
Her dark blue dress was skin-tight and accentuated her features.

The other front-of-the-house staff consisted of three
women who were obviously sisters. All three were young, shapely, and flirty.
The customers were all men who were not elegant or clean-shaven.

I took a booth and waited for one of the women to
make her way to me. It was a man who approached me first, reeking of beer and
trying his best to hold in his gut. He wasn’t terribly drunk, but he was making
his way there.

“What is such a pretty lady doing all on her own at
night?”

I gave him my most innocent smile and waved to the
seat across from me, inviting him to sit. He did with a great grunt as the
entire bench sagged under his weight. Without magic, I couldn’t tell how much
of it was muscle and how much was fat, but he wasn’t revolting by any means.
Alcohol made a man weak of mind, but I wouldn’t judge a person for making any
attempt to escape their lives. Some people had been dealt nasty hands and they
truly deserved sympathy, even from the gods.

“Just looking for someone to spend some time with,” I
said, not suggestively. I wanted him to be willing to talk, not think I was
easy. If he thought I was only a little interested, he would try to entice me,
but if he thought I wanted him, he would only try to get me upstairs and give
up quickly when he realized otherwise. Had I not been mated to Dylan, I would
have done what I needed to get a man talking, but I would never betray Dylan.

If the gods had morals about anything, it was the
“old way.” Vretial had told us stories about honor, life, battles, and mates.
He told us about the values of the gods before the war. Those values may not
always make sense to us, but we all agreed to uphold them for our race’s sake.
While I could remember my childhood, I was separated from the other Iadnah. I
remembered the war, but that was all my childhood was. Of all my brothers, only
Vretial remembered their lives before the end of the war.

The man started talking about his job, which was
reconstructing some of the buildings in this neighborhood. It was almost
perfect. I gave him just a miniscule wisp of fear, which got him talking about
working at night. Some men would feel fear and clamp up, as was the natural
instinct for this man, but my pheromones were soothing as well as seductive and
without a single word from me, he was telling me everything.

He told me that working at night used to be favored,
but for the past few months, people were disappearing. More specifically, women
were disappearing.

“How are they connected?” I asked. “Are they
prostitutes? Business women?”

“The first ones were servants over at the Brarir
Manor. Now others are disappearing as well, especially prostitutes. No one with
families, fortunately.”

At this point, the waitress arrived, where the man
ordered another beer and I ordered a tea. She asked if I wanted a menu, but I
wasn’t in the mood to eat. Once I received my tea, I let the man drink his
alcohol before pressing him further.

“The master of the Brarir Manor, does he have a job?”

“Taron-sep owns this town. He receives all money
generated by the businesses and pays the staff poorly. The prostitutes are paid
well, but they must serve him for free. If they refuse, he takes them by force
and then he doesn’t pay them. You’re not here to work, are you?”