Jackal Among Snakes

Garm knelt down and picked a black rose from the endless field. He held it up to his face, twirling it about with his fingers. The black petals began to twitch… and then exploded outwards as a mass of flesh.

Opposite Garm, Durran panicked and jumped back at the unexpected sight. Garm could see his face morph with surprise, his sole desire becoming getting away. And the man did—he jumped back near fifty feet, practically flying in the sky. Garm had summoned some of his favorite creations, an Order of the Rose specialty: bats of flesh and skin, knives attached to their wings. Deadly, numerous creatures.

Fighting was different when souls battled. This battle was a representation of something their minds could not comprehend. It was like living in a lucid dream—will alone could conjure all manner of assaults, oddities. Garm had neglected to inform Durran of this, but the boy was sharp—he was sure things would be figured out quickly.

“Back when I was alive, I could make one of these bats with a single arm,” Garm called out to Durran. Voices reached everywhere in this strange realm of the soul. “Enough skin for the wings, enough bones for the important bits… I look forward to trying it out again with a different set of hands, this time.”

“Keep looking forward,” Durran called back, unbothered. Garm was surprised by his mental fortitude. He flailed about in the sky, falling. The boy was as sharp as Garm had expected, though—wind around him swirled, then morphed into a giant gray wyvern, lifting him up into the sky. “When we’re finished with this, I’ll be sure to enjoy it on your behalf,” the tribal answered back, vigor, excitement, and fear marking his voice.

“As green as you are? It’ll be some years before you come near my expertise,” Garm refuted with a grin. He held his hand out, a spell matrix swirling. When it completed, wind billowed beneath his feet, and he burst upwards into the sky. “That’s why you’ll lose.”

“You’re aged,” Durran refuted, wyvern gliding about. “Senile, even. Not a chance for you.”

“Tell me, then,” Garm began, his bats rising up alongside him. “What made you as you are? Cynical, bitter?”

“This is a fight, not a spar,” Durran cut him off, then threw his glaive at Garm. “No time for talk.”

“Fighting like this isn’t as you think,” Garm shook his head, then easily maneuvered around the glaive. It crashed to the sand below, spreading a black could of debris across the landscape. “Talk doesn’t distract. We’re souls, now, not brains. The least we can do for the loser is carry on some memories. I’ll remember you, to be sure. To prove my point… how about I break the ice?”

Garm sent forth his summoned bats with another spell, and the creatures frenzied to obey. They sought their target like a locust plague. Garm controlled them, talking all the while.

“Myself, I learned the world was a hellscape as soon as I was old enough to understand what ‘hellscape’ means,” Garm explained. “Parents dropped me in the canals at Nodremaid. I clung to the walls, not one year old—or so I’m told. It was a long time ago. Probably seven hundred years.”

Durran struggled to contest with the bats, casting impotent magic, killing one or two at a time. “You’ve got me beat there,” Durran admitted. “In terms of tragedies, at the very least. My parents were decent. I was the last and eighth child.”

Durran’s wyvern braced, and then spun about in an impossible manner, obliterating too many of the bats. Garm readied high-ranking electric magic—the knives stuck in the wyvern’s flesh would attract it, making aiming easier.

“But you were the heir to the tribe?” Garm questioned, sending a bolt of lightning as thick as a pillar forth. The wyvern howled as it struck its wing. “Unless your tribe has some bizarre, meritorious succession, let me guess—they all died.”

out across the infinite landscape. Magic cost nothing but willpower—might as well use the expensive lightning magic, he figured. But Durran stepped atop the snout of his wyvern, grasping its horn. He leapt from its maw, and the horn he held morphed into

raise his arm up to receive the blow, reeling away a great distance. “My uncle drove my older twin sisters to suicide. Don’t know why, but I can guess. Guy was always a worthless creep. Without proof, without any testimony besides mine, the tribe left him unpunished. He

morphed back into a wyvern, and he pursued Garm. “I found out, then, that if you want something, you have to make it happen.

block the approaching pair. “People that toy with kids, they’re like rabid animals—the best thing to do

he approached. Garm sent out his wind magic, and the wyvern rider was knocked off the back, falling towards a field of roses. “Some people would say the same of necromancers.

patrol about. These things,” Garm explained, conjuring a spell matrix as he landed amidst his field of black roses. At once, several of the roses blossomed into the Guardians of the Low Way. Unlike those Argrave and his companions had seen, these had not degenerated—they

someone had to help you,” Durran insisted, collapsing just opposite Garm amidst

confirmed. “A teenager. Helped me learn the streets, gave me some food… then, when I was eight, he tried to sell me to some High

a captivating, dance-like fighting style—he would cast magic with one hand, letting it hang in the air for a moment, then he’d cut the spell with his glaive. The spell would wreathe

do you do that?” Garm tilted his head,

spells can attach to the blade, I found out.

to be doubly safe. The glaive sunk deep into the earth, poking out the opposite side. Durran vaulted atop the wall, lunging at Garm. The High Wizard was prepared—he used blood magic, conjuring a

forced him to the ground, then grabbed his hair, punching with his free hand. The blows hurt enough to remind Garm that he was

prepared a powerful spell, but Durran scrambled away, moving back behind the wall. Garm rose to his feet, walking backwards with blood trickling down his

didn’t get experimented on by that High Wizard?” Durran

“They don’t really expect someone to hit them in the head,” he wiped the blood off his face, noting the irony. “I got the jump on him. He never expected an eight-year-old to know how to kill people, but

“And you got away?”

wizard friends came by to check on him later that day. I told

“Terrible lie,” Durran admonished.

to be there,” Garm turned his head to where the voice had come from. Just then, Durran lunged out. He conjured sparks, then swung his glaive. Garm ducked the lightning-wreathed attack, then tackled the man’s knees. They both fell

smiled, ready to return what he’d just been given. “As a matter of fact, they inducted me into the Order of the Rose because of that

With blood pouring out, Garm fell backwards, and Durran got some distance. Garm didn’t neglect the spell he’d been preparing, this time—a great lance of wind as big as Durran himself surged

as the both of them

sit up. “Gods above…” he rubbed his bloodstained, but healed, throat. “You got far too good at this

slightly gored by the powerful spell. He glared at

your siblings—what

battle,” Durran explained. “They died against other tribals more than they did Vessels, can you believe that? We were pushed to near-extinction, and still, they fought amongst themselves. Absolutely moronic.” Durran rose to his feet, torso still a

and readying himself. “Made that mistake once or twice, myself. It’s why we’re here, now.” He laughed, then shook his head. “Thought maybe I could do better by my son than I was done.” His smile faded. “But he was the one to kill me. My last student. My only child.” He stared