The Ivory Star

Chapter 16

Eric reached out with his aura, sensing his surroundings, his breath hot in the heavy cloth hood engulfing his head.

"Where am I sitting?" Sordus asked.

He "saw" the shape of Sordus's flickering, pulsating aura. "Before me, slightly to the left."

"What else is here?"

Eric extended his kii further, and located a symmetric fluctuation in his aura behind him. He scrutinized it carefully. No life. Curving symmetry. Smooth surfaces. Finely textured.

"A vase," he said.

"Good," Sordus said. "What else?"

His searching mind probed the small chamber he was in, searching for more. An empty space. "A small fireplace," he said.

"More."

"Seven logs."

"Good!"

Eric suppressed a surge of pride. He could sense all these things, as he sat cross-legged on the floor in the center of the small, stone-walled room.

Emotion flooded his aura of awareness. Approval. Satisfaction.

"What do I hold in my hand, student?"

Eric's mind reached out to feel what Sordus held. Cold. Hard. Steel! "A sword," he said.

"Correct," Sordus told him. "Remove your hood." Eric did so, and Sordus continued. "Your lessons have gone far better than I imagined they would. In the past thirty-day, I have seen the strength of your kii-sense surpass that of many lifelong Knights I have known. You've been taught in the ways of the mind, and of the flesh. The awareness of the mind and spirit is instrumental in the awareness of the warrior. For the warrior who sees nothing, life is short. It is now time for you to learn the warrior's art. Come."

Eric followed him into the hallway. He had learned much in his stay at the Sanctuary. Life here was good, peaceful even, in strange juxtaposition to the Eagle Knights' purpose for existence and their focus on the arts of combat. As his lessons progressed, his long-dormant mental abilities manifested. Sordus explained to him that his previously untapped spirit was emerging. And as it did, Eric's confidence and abilities bloomed.

Eric had grown quite comfortable with this world, his new home. He rarely thought of Mars anymore. This was his home now. And over the time he had spent here, he thought with some amusement, his constant use of his new language increased his proficiency, and he often found himself thinking in it as well.

He and Sordus spent hours talking about many things. They discussed philosophy on occasion, art, history, science. He wrestled with the idea of using the science that he knew to make advances in society here, first simple things, like pumps or rudimentary medicine, then later perhaps gunpowder and electricity. He imagined an army of Armondians armed with matchlock rifles facing Sneev's army of ill-trained men-at-arms, but then considered the consequences through human history of the use of guns. Such a thing should probably wait. He could not help but smile at Sordus's reaction when he learned of Eric's own origins. He told him the whole story, and Sordus believed it without reservation. Sordus was amazed at Eric's knowledge of astronomy and the sciences, and Eric delighted in telling him stories of "wondrous machines".

* * *

One day Sordus was relating to Eric some of Eorthe's history, and Eric asked what he knew about the Priests of the Red Circle.

A look of distaste and revulsion crept into Sordus's normally impassive features. With a sigh that contained something of both shame and anger, he said, "Their Order is old, almost as old as ours. No one in the outside world is aware of what I am about to tell you. Once, long ago, a small band of Eagle Knights were expelled from Sanctuary, exiled for twisting good magic into evil, corrupting the benevolence of Eagle Knight magic into unspeakable rites of black sorcery. They were discovered one night performing an evil ritual, robing all in black, sitting within a scarlet circle painted in the floor. The Master of that time ordered them to cease their madness, but they defied him, condemning the Eagle Knights for using their knowledge and arts for greater good. The Eagle Knights could harness the black arts to destroy Uhr and rule Eorthe, they said. They proclaimed autonomy, while still demanding access to the knowledge of deeper mysteries, doubtless to corrupt that as well. The Master cast them out, and the Order drove them from the Viderian Mountains. The outcasts settled in the Vicorian range to the north, and built for themselves a fortress and temple to their chaotic gods. Priests of the Red Circle. The very day following the outcasts' departure, the old Sanctuary was struck by lightning in a mysterious storm, and burned to the ground. It was that blaze that destroyed nearly all our records of the Ivory Star. The only records saved were those of Uhr's rise to power, and his battle with Andorus, and that the Ivory Star indeed exists.