Blades and Battle Mages

Chapter 1: Tensions

I roll back and forth in my cot, covered in a tanned leather. A nice addition to my room. The pelt of a black Night Stalker. A highly camouflaged breed of saber cat. I rolled over and looked around the wooden house. Though I was upstairs I barely felt that high up. It was a two-story house made from the wood grow in these parts. We call them grey-lock trees due to the greyish color they become once changed into logs. 

The room itself was very bare as I burned most of the things I didn't need. Too many reminders of my family. I owned the biggest house in town due to inheriting it after my parent's death. An Orc raiding party stormed the gates. Somehow they flanked around through a breach in the wall. Killed over 50 citizens including my parents.

I got up the floor giving off quiet squeaks as I walk around. The room had two dressers, a wardrobe, and a fireplace with a family painting above it. The downstairs was left only with beds, I had turned it into an emergency shelter if we need to retreat to the mansion walls. Unlike the city these were made from a rare obsidian-like ore we mine in the mountains. We refer to it as Bane ore due to its hard and deadly nature. 

Most of our community is based on woodworking, mining, and hunting. We were deep in the woods of our country so our land was very luscious and fruitful. I was noble of this settlement. There were eleven nobles in each country. One lord in charge of all seven countries and a high king in charge of everything down in Attila. The lands were vast so the responsibilities were split between many. The Lords had their council allowing them to vote on laws. The king only ever made an appearance in certain cases and during great travesties. 

Though the town was small the Bane was priceless, we kept its existence a secret using it for our own arms and equipment. I wore a thin mail layer of it underneath the hardened leather armor. Light and highly efficient. I also have a family blade made from it. It was a long with a hooked end similar to a mixture of a scimitar and a sickle. This allowed it to have good reach, its sharp and strong material made it cut through most metals, and the hooked end allowed fantastic parrying.

The blade though very unique was not the thing that made my family important see in all countries only the Lords possessed magical capabilities in their bloodline usually giving birth to up to 9 highly efficient children. Though I am only a noble my family is one of the few known to have a child born with these abilities every couple years. I am that child. Though magic has been around for thousands of years we still barely understand it, leaving our capabilities at an assumed unlimited amount.

My family had a library next to my room with books and journals from previous magic users outlining spells and their lives. I studied them since I was 6 as that's when my abilities first appeared. I seem to have a good connection with the spirit realm allowing me to summon non-physical versions of the dead. I can talk with them and sometimes allow them to do things in our realm. I possess minor skills in combat magic as I only got 2 years of training before the attack.

I looked out the upstairs window towards the village, A wall of almost transparent black was the only thing that differed me from my people. I saw us as equal but it was easy to see I had an easier life than them. I had an agreement with a Dwarven Clan down past our mountains. We trade ore and wood for food, money, and other valuables. This group of Dwarves was different as many of the other cultures are divided into tribes which were significantly smaller. Though we lived in the far east of Phorshire where it is more humid and covered in animals and vegetation. Most of the cultures here were Elven and Goblins. This group of Dwarves had been pushed from their mountain ranges in the south by a growing army of Fangsin. A large army of Lizardfolk slowly expanding. They took over half of the country below us. They were wedged in two wars though between an Orc clan and Gnomes.

The Gnomes were an interesting bunch, though small they were the greatest tinkerers of our age. They built steel golems to fight the war for them as they used crossbows at the range. Each golem was worth 3 regiments of men. The Orcs on the other side were quite educated compared to others. Helped us during the Orc/Goblin uprising in the east earning themselves a big chunk of land. They bought many weapons from our blacksmiths though I knew little of their land due to most information being destroyed because of rising hostilities. Rumors were spread the Orcs were siding with the Fangsin, but the proof is yet to be seen.