Path of the Necromancer - FACTION WARS

Chapter 7..2 - The Spirit Realm

'What is a day in the eyes of revolution?' The old man asked himself. It was a good question. One to which he had spent many hours, days, nights and dreams contemplating. For a day meant little in the lifetime of regret and harsh decisions. His sad eyes, sunken into a weathered face full of wrinkles, blinked slowly.

Days meant little in truth, unless viewed by the calendar in which recorded the events that led to this day. Winter of scorching heat that crumbled the rock to dust and sand. Summer that bit into the bones of the weak, shattering them with a snap of wind so fierce it made the mountains themselves peel their skin. The calendar told of the raids, the deaths, the strife. The trouble swirled the palace like water draining from a basin. The outer regions no longer pledged fealty, the nobles squabbled like chickens in a coup and his own family now splintered over what remained.

The old man, the latest in a long line of Kings, sat silently as the chamber around him echoed with the sounds of change. It was a constant pressure, one that strained the rule of his father, and his fathers before him. Now it strained him to the point he had foreseen coming across his long and troubled life.

Bleached stone columns arched overhead to crest in a ceiling inlaid with gold. These veins of enchanted metal tapering along those marble obelisks to create the temperate climate they currently enjoyed. The amphitheatre never felt the rain, nor the dust, nor even the wind that currently wailed beyond their invisible boundary. The King noticed this. He might have been the only one.

The tiered seating brimmed to overflow. The peoples that made up the upper tiers of his society, the Mages, their voices clamoured over one another in vain attempts to be heard. It mattered nought. Only the voice of those closest to the Throne the calendar would record.

"Our King provides the word of the Gods!" A loyalist supporter countered a particularly ludicrous challenge. Murmurs of support rose, yet even the elderly King - half deaf in one ear - could hear they were in the minority.

"Is there no chance of reconciliation?" A plaintives voice pleaded from somewhere deep within the room. "We stand on the precipice of destroying ourselves if this feud continues any longer. If we continue to bicker and squabble among our own, a separation will duly follow! All that we've known and fought to protect will be utterly destroyed by our own hand."

"Then we should accept the new order of things and be done with it!" A distinguished figure called from his seat of prominence, gaining a cry of support from the weary hall.

"Our ancestors wrestled the world from chaos," The Prince, striding forward from his father's side, sniped. "Would you have us toss this aside in your self interests?" The green vortex that tourbilled within his eyes illuminated those it focused on, pinning them with their own shame. "This city... Our entire civilization was forged from the blackness and chaos that dominated the world! We were charged with the mandate of maintaining the balance that holds these elements of chaos beyond the reach of those untrusted with its use."

"There!" The man snarled, crooked finger jabbing at the Prince. "there again we have the same line!" The man sneered. It was an ugly thing, a diseased look of malcontent and viciousness. "Who decides who is untrustworthy? You do! And how do you decide who is to be trusted, the measures you take or the methods you use? You refuse to state! You claim the power for yourselves, covet it and use it to oppress the weak. You, are 'nothing,' but a tyrant!" The man flung the insult at his uncle: a few shifted nervously as a dark aura pooled at the speaker's feet. "You sit upon your tower, your podium of prestige and take from others their birthright!"

The crowd cheered in support. Words of hate, hurt and resentment flickered with the intensity of the wall sconces. The calendar that recorded these events watched as the words were scattered into the coming storm.