Kael drove up, pressing the horn long and loud – three short, two long, one short. Mike took in his surroundings now; there were five buildings that he could count. One central rambling two-story house, three sheds, two barns, with the land cleared all around.
Mike had never been on a real farm, never mind a farm in the middle of Turkey. Kael leaned forward as they drove up. Pavle got a few folks’ attention; two men and one woman came out as the jeep shuddered to a halt in the gravel in front of the house. Kael leapt out, standing there, stretching a moment with a grin. He called in English “Erica! ?skender! Roeland!” he grins wide and drops a hand to Mike’s shoulder “Michael, or Mike LeBonte. And yes think your worst, all true.”
Mike couldn’t help but blush, almost stepping to the rear, but Kael had a firm hand on his shoulder. They were among friends here, Mike realized. He could stand down. Erica gave Mike an appraising look a moment, then smiled a bit; ?skender stepped forward to bear-hug Kael. Mike stepped back, half hoping that Iskender wouldn’t pull him into that kind of crushing grip. Iskender let him go with a grin, then gripped both Mike’s hands for a double hand-shake, firm not hurting. Roeland, youngest of the three, gave the same casual salute to Kael then Mike, like the one that Kael often gave some people, and said nothing.
“You are hungry, yes?” asked Erika the group of men.
Mike’s stomach rumbled and he hoped it wasn’t loud enough to hear. English, she spoke English.
“Come follow me,” Erika said, and Iskender put his arm around Kael. They spoke in low tones and Iskender laughed, a hearty laugh that meant a shared joke, but not at Mike’s expense. He hoped.
As they entered, Kael put his hand on Mike’s shoulder and leaned forward to whisper, “We are safe here, but be wary, love.”
Mike nodded, and the smell of the kitchen filled his mind. He smelled bread, and meat, and something grilling. He inhaled and his stomach rumbled again.
“Sit, sit,” said Iskender, opening up a chair for Mike.
Mike smiled at him and sat down, saying in Turkish, “Thank you.”
“You American, you speak English?” said Iskender, struggling with the words in English.
“I can speak your language too,” Mike said..
“Speak English,” he said. He motioned to the rest of the party. “All learn.”
Erika shook her head. “Not now, Iskender. They’ve just come back from a long trip. Let them rest.”
Iskender looked despondent. “I’ll speak English too,” Mike said, and translated that into Turkish. “If you want,” he added.
“Whatever you are comfortable with,” Erika said, and set bread on the table. She also set a carafe on the table and two tea cups. Mike waited for Kael to take his first. Kael smiled at Mike, and poured Mike’s beverage himself. Mike sniffed it – it was simple, black tea. He sighed – something familiar – and sipped it.
What followed next were some figs and dates, and by this time Mike could hold back no longer and dug in. They were soaked in something sweet, probably alcohol, though as he had a date he could picture the scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark with the monkey eating dates and how that resulted.
Friends, dammit, thought Mike. All that high alert had really kicked up his adrenaline, and it was going to be a hard and heavy crash.
Erika then put out two plates for them. On the plates were three very large meatballs in a tomato sauce, but on a bed of rice instead of spaghetti. Mike laughed when he saw it, and then looked sheepish at their looks. “I am used to seeing this – “ he repeated “as tutmaç.”
“We have no noodles,” said Erika.
“It’s fine! I’ll eat this!” He dug into the food. “I enjoy trying new things.” He took a small bite, to make sure that it wasn’t peppery or had some hidden spice that was overdone. It wasn’t quite like Italian tomato sauce, but it was tolerable.
Iskender sat down across from them and took some dates. Roeland also sat, but he was quiet. “How is America, Kael? Lots of pretty boys?”
Kael gave Mike a warm smile. The whole room all said, “Ohhhhhh.”
Mike grinned and blushed, and Iskender punched Mike in the arm. It wasn’t quite lightly, but wasn’t hard, either. “You are a lucky man, my American English friend,” boomed Iskender. “Shall I tell him of all the times you embarrassed yourself?”
“All what times?” asked Erika. “Most of the time, it was you.”
“Even so! I almost had him! Remember the time–”
“Not now, Iskender,” said Roeland quietly. “Let the men eat, and let them rest.”
Mike didn’t like the silence; he never did. “So what kind of animals do you have here?”
Erika answered, “Goats, cows, chickens, pigs, sheep, horses–”
“Men,” Iskender said with a wink.
“Did you grow the food to make this? This is wonderful, by the way.”
Iskender laughed, “A cup of coffee commits one to forty years of friendship.” At Mike’s confused look, he said, “It is a saying of ours.”
“Oh. But it really is good.”
Again, Mike sopped up the sauce with the Lava? and sat back, full. He sipped the tea, nibbled on some more dates, and listened to the conversation. In mere moments, he found himself drifting.
“I think a shower and sleep are in order,” said Kael with a yawn. Mike followed.
“Let me show you where to sleep.”
Mike followed Kael and Erika to a room on the first floor. “The shower is there,” she pointed to a room two doors down.
As they went inside, Roelander and Iskender followed, carrying the bags. “Pleasant dreams, I will see you tomorrow.”
Kael let Mike take the first shower, and by then he stumbled back to the bed. He climbed in and was already dozing by the time Kael climbed in and spooned against him. Kael yawned and murmured, “Tomorrow, for talk.”
#
Mike awoke, patting the side of bed. “Kael?” he murmured, and opened his eyes. No, no Kael. No note. No nothing. He turned on the light – it was dark still. There was no sign of him.
“Like a damn thief in the night,” Mike whispered and glanced outside, guessing the time by the placement of the North Star and the Big Dipper. The moon was fading, so it wasn’t too far off from dawn.
He thought he could hear noises in the house. He grabbed some clothes, performed some quick ablutions in the bathroom, and changed into some jeans and a t-shirt. He found his way down the halls to the kitchen. Two people were cooking, a man and a woman, and there were a couple of other men – he figured they were farmhands – eating.
He touched the green amulet. “Hi, has anyone seen Kael?”
They all looked him over for a minute. Did he ask a bad question? Did the amulet not translate right? The cook said to him, in badly-accented English, “Path – “ He pointed out through the window. “No pass white stones.” He then pressed in his hand a burlap tote. Inside looked like a thermos and some food. He also gave him a flashlight. “No pass white stones,” he repeated.
Mike only nodded and went outside. “A path,” he said, peering in the dark. Would anyone notice if he used magic, to see where anyone travelled?
He passed his hands before his eyes and whispered in Latin, “Selene, show me the steps of others.”
He opened his eyes and could see white footprints against the dark ground. There, a set of footprints led away from the farm and toward the woods. Then the moon came out from behind the clouds and hid the path with the light. Mike muttered his thanks, though he would have liked to see it for a little longer. He followed to the path – which looked more like a rabbit trail. But it had been used recently.
He flicked off the flashlight and kept his head bowed, and walked for a little bit in the woods. His city-boy sense got a little nervous, but the mage part of him had done this kind of walking in the woods all the time. He started using some of the techniques he had learned as a mage for calming – keep walking forward, keep on the trail.
He got slapped in the head with a low-hanging branch. Okay, maybe I shouldn’t keep my head down. The moon ducked behind a cloud again, plunging the place in darkness. He flicked on the flashlight again.
Then he heard it. A clang, but not a clang of a bell. Not really a clang. More like someone hit a xylophone key, a crystal clear note. He stopped for a minute, listening. The night and the air chilled him, and he hugged himself. “Should have gotten a ja–”
There, again. If he knew music better, he would know what key. He was never a musical mage.
He turned back to the path, noticed it looped broadly, and he heard the sound of a cow lowing, seemingly far away in the distance. He kept going, and heard the clang again – the clear note. Then a few more in succession, like someone was trying to peck out a song on the piano with single notes. He wanted to go off the path, but the trees looked damn thick, and he didn’t want to burst through them like a mage.
No magic, he admonished himself, and started walking some more. Eventually all he could hear were tones, sometimes close, sometimes far, as the path wound and wound. He got to a rise, and as he did, came down, and came to another rise, seeing a fire burning and two figures moving. He went down the rise heading toward the second rise, as the moon stepped out of the clouds again
He saw the white stones. He did not pass them, like the man had told him, but he could still see clearly, and almost couldn’t believe his eyes and ears.
He had found Kael. Mike stepped sideways off the path and set down the tote and stuck the flashlight in it. Mike sunk to the ground, knelt back on his haunches and watched, being quiet.
Kael looked like he did when he fought with Mike, and performed his katas, but there was another man – something – with him. Both men had swords and used them, and every time the swords struck each other, that same musical tone filled the air. To Mike, it was like watching dancers and listening to classical music – something he wished he could do, and something that would bring anyone joy to watch.
However, the movements were not sparring, but they were in serious combat here. Sometimes the dance was slow and the music reflected that. Sometimes fast, with rolls, dodges, feints and parries. Sometimes it looked like the shadows themselves were in the dance, pressing against Kael. The sword-songs would change pitch with the movement, and sometimes there would be another “clang” that, while matching the song in its entirety, would seem just a bit “off”. Is that what a coda is? A pause? As he watched, he realized the coda was that a “hit” was scored. Neither of them seemed to stop, but continued the fight. Mike knew, that if he was there, he’d be well past exhausted by now.
He could hear Kael’s breathing. There was a pause for a moment, and then Mike noticed Kael had two blades, one long, one short, like how he himself fights. Mike leaned forward a bit from his cover. The sword songs were faster now, though not as loud, a torrent of cascading tones, flowing into each other.
Kael hit a stone near the man’s foot, and the stone shattered. The other man backpedaled and lifted his sword as a shield across his body. Kael pressed it, but the man returned it. They keep going, not stopping, Kael taking shallow breaths, but still continuing, swords ringing against each other. Mike watched, caught up in the dance, his hand at his mouth to not say anything to disturb the beauty.
Then, the sun came up.
At that instant, they both stopped, the sword-song’s tone hanging in the air. Both men bowed to each other, blades down, and the fire flickered out. Kael turned in Mike’s direction. “Mike!” he called, panting, sweaty, and with a broad smile. Mike slowly rose, and as he did, he noticed the other man was gone.
“Was that…the man…we fought before?” Things started clicking…
Kael Marduc shook his head, “No, you mean in the charge to work out Hades’ words and all? no. You’ve just met a spirit, Mike.”
Mike asked, “What were you doing, love?” He looked down at the white stones, remembering the words to not pass.
Kael stepped forward took Mike’s hand, “Come over here love?”
Mike slowly walked over, looking around. There was an ancient-looking firepit only, with no sign of a fire. But he could have sworn…
Kael looked at the sun, then back at him. “You trust me an awful lot, Mike.”
“I’ve told you; I trust you with my life, Kael.”
Kael went back to what he was talking about initially. “So here today I was sparring with a spirit, actually once a man, died, oh, two thousand years ago?”
“But why? To gain control of the area, what?”
Kael nodded a bit, thinking. “I need to work harder at this, sorry. I need to work harder at telling you what I am doing, at not not saying things, love. Give you the option to know, if you want, is all.” He went back again to the original purpose of the question. “I was sparring to train. Think kata, focus, concentration, love. Think clarity of action, thought, evocation of the world around, mindfullness – in the midst of combat.”
Mike said, “Shit, I could do that.”
Kael smiled. “Could do, which?”
“I could spar with you. Unless – well, I know I’m still a student.”
Kael walked over to a crevice in the rocks. He pulled a stone sword seemingly out of the crevice and handed it to Mike. “You can always spar with me, Mike. Now, how would you make fire here? To spar by?”
Mike snapped his fingers, saying a single sound, and pointed to the fire pit. A flame burst up out of it. Mike nodded and saluted Kael, who returned it. Then they began to spar using a kata they had practiced often. The swords struck each other, but the tones were different; lower, not as pure, mechanical.
Mike pulled up his sword. “Why the spirit?”
Kael Marduc did also. “Ahh, because I am at that point in a path, he is the one to teach me?” He started again, a different kata, but the sounds seemed the same. He said quietly, “What you saw? A lot of outsiders would consider it a ‘sacred’ thing.”
“It’s why I didn’t want to disturb you. I should have just turned away.”
“No, you should have and did stay, why should I hide this from you if you chose to come?”
Mike followed the moves, and gave him a look. “I could tell that it was sacred, love.” Kael looked a little abashed at that. However Mike noticed the swords were not singing as they were before, and because he was used to using swords two hands, his left hand was parrying, though without a weapon. “What’s wrong?”
Kael grinned, in the moment, “Nothing is wrong? Why do you ask?’
Mike said, “The swords aren’t making the same sounds.”
Kael nodded “No, they are not. We are doing kata, and I wonder….”
Kael stopped and got another blade, passing it to him. “Here, love.”
Mike took the smaller blade and hefted it, now feeling better.
Kael went in for a more complex attack. Mike, in a flurry of movement, parried as best he could. No magic, no magic…
The tones of the swords come more easily, still lacking in some respect. Kael stepped back a moment, then pressed Mike very hard.
Mike gasped and automatically dropped the left-handed blade, making a sign to summon a dark shield around him.
All at the same time, the fire died and Mike felt a rebound – his will bounced back to him and hurt, something that only happened to his when a spell backfired, and it had been a very long time when a spell backfired like that. Also at the same time, Kael turned and slammed his blade downward, slicing through the shield as if it was nothing, a beautiful tone of triumph singing from the blade, then Mike had brought his sword up across his body, so the blade struck that sword, letting out a low, mournful tone.
Mike winced, then his eyes widened as the two men stood mere inches from each other. “Yield!” Mike yelled. Kael gasped. The effect didn’t seem lost on him, either.
Kael stepped back, the blade down, and the tip on the ground. “Mike, are you all right?” He was panting. It took a lot out of him to do that, it seemed.
Mike was near shaking. He could have been killed, and his magic didn’t stop him. It should have stopped Kael. “You shouldn’t have been able to do that, not with what…I thought you were.” More things clicked into place in Mike’s mind. Amazing things. Things he had never contemplated.
Kael sat down and offered Mike some water. “We are in what some wouild call a consecrated place, has been for thousands of years, Mike.”
Mike took the offered water and the shaking started. He soiled a consecrated place. The gods would be angry. “I’m sorry – it was a habit – I didn’t mean to–”
“And the flame, ahh the flame. Flame is very special, sometimes., and–” Kael grinned, “you did fine.”
Kael gave him that crooked smile “Flame can illuminate. What I was doing before? Was a microcosm of what I am doing with Cal, by the way. And he with me, love. Think about it. Someone like Cal is constantly trying to own the battlefield. I am too.” He chuckled a little. “I could pass your shield as a teacher, lover, trusted one, love.”
Mike studied Kael intently, really intently. Finally, he couldn’t hold it back, but said it very quietly: “What are you?”
“Me?”
Mike looked away, embarrassed he even uttered that out loud.
Kael said, after a very short pause, “Truly, honestly, just a lucky man, love. I follow a certain path and discipline which defines me, I choose to do that. It’s inclusive: I was born, became a merc like Alex, left and travelled, came into this general area, learned, learned well. Died once, a true death. Fell. Came back.”
Mike’s eyes widened in recognition. “Fallen!”
Kael blinked at the term, “Yes, I get called that a lot. Is a mark, of a kind, I guess.”
Mike put his head in his hands. How could he think Kael was a fallen angel, after all this time? Especially after he took Mike into the spirit world, and helped him versus Hades and his harbinger, Starwyng… “And here I was thinking you were a demon.”
Kael shrugged a bit, embarrassed.
Mike asked, “So you’re immortal?”
Kael grinned at that, came over, and sat beside him. “Do not think so? May well, at the end of my life, continue somehow. Others do, in these parts. You might too, who knows, Mike? That is, I hope, a distant bridge.” He leaned against Mike. “I have my hands full with living, love.”
Mike took his hand. “I – Wow, I really leap to conclusions, don’t I?”
Kael smiled, “Maybe? Like I said, I have to work a little harder at not not saying things, love.”
“You’re not used to having someone tag along with you on these kinds of things, are you?”
Kael Marduc shook his head, “I am not. like I said, i have never been partnered, as in me and you, before. And Scott’s important in this too.”
He looked relieved.
Kael considered. “We were sparring earlier, the magic you defaulted to was ‘out of place’,. hence you got the full weight of.. lots of things. if… you’d manifested the magic a little differently, it would’ve worked, I think.”
Mike said, “In other words. No dark magic here, in a consecrated place. It would be as if I called up a demon in a basin of holy water.”
Kael asked Mike, curious, “What do you mean by ‘dark magic’, Mike?”
“Using the powers of the abyss as a supplement to my own.”
Kael nodded and asked again, “Abyss? Clarify?”
Mike explained that the after the real world and the spirit world was an abyss, a place of darkness and power.
“And the Abyss-empowered magic is intrinsic to what and what you are, your very being?’
“I’m connected to it, yes. And I suppose I could cut the connection, but then my energy would have to come from ley lines or outside or other lives or something else. My will is, uh, intrinsically tied, I guess.”
Kael, again curious asked “Why do you think that here is bad?’
“Here, this consecrated place, isn’t ‘bad’. It’s something I can’t connect to.”
Kael said “Oh. Why do you say ‘bad’? Is abyssal magic inherently ‘bad’, mike?”
“It’s in the way you use it, Kael. It’s not bad, but I can’t really use it in good places.”
Kael gave Mike an odd look, “Why do you think this is a ‘good’ place, then?” He grinned and poked Mike’s abs. “No defining bad in terms of good.”
“I don’t feel like anything like death can happen here.”
Kael blinked, “Odd, of course it can.” and he looked at the flame a long time. “Mike?”
Mike focused on Kael. “Yes, love?”
Kael said, “It’s context, Mike. Say we are equal, hypothetically, in power. That is, we can each cause equal amounts of destruction or change. With me?” Mike nodded. “That means the sum of each of us is equal. Your sum includes abyssal empowerments, mine does not. Still with me?”
Mike looked upward, thinking. “Yes, I think I got it.”
Kael continued, “Okay. Now, context. I try to be mindful, aware, of the surroundings. I work within that. Try to understand it. Make sense?”
“Yes”.
“In your home environment, oh, Dark mage, my love, I’d be hard pressed to do what I did then, or rather, what I caused to happen. But if you are in a place, and cause something that is ‘out of place’, it stands out like a sore thumb. Easy target. If you act out of place where we are going, for example, that’ll be quite noticeable to a lot of…things. Had you chosen to use your Abyssal magics to…say, enhance the blade, or an element of the environment, to your advantage? Different story.” Kael grinned. “Each time you -see- me ‘go epic’, that’s me at a last resort, love, or in a place where epic is the norm. If I go in and flame up with holy fire, that’ll call down a lot of grief, trust me. If you call down blatant abyssal magics, things around will -know-, you know.” He added quietly, “More: any Will expressed that is not known to them. Does not matter what it is, love.”
“Magic is like breathing to me. I have to be conscious and mindful to not use it.”
Kael nodded, “Well, good! Breathe away. And why in hell would you ever choose to be not mindful?” the last was curious in tone
Mike said, “I’m not mindful in a lot of ways. I don’t pay attention.”
Kael leaned forward to rest his forehead on Mike’s. “That can change, love. really. Up to you, it’s no biggie. just a slow thing.” Softly, he added, “You have just said ahh…‘I go around asleep, and so sometimes when I use magic I am not really sure where I am, and just make changes.’”
Mike recited one of the first things he had learned as a mage. “Magic is the art of changing the environment to be in accordance with your will.”
“Of course it is! But tell me, if you could change the environment in a way natural or expected in that environment, or simple carte blanche impose something alien to it, which would you choose?”
“If what I needed was alien, then I would impose that. But if what I needed was natural, I would do that. However, natural and expected magic is a lot easier, because the environment is expecting that change, eventually. I’m just hastening it.”
“Sounds good, love. To me? My way, I hope, says ‘I am in the world’, and I know the world is much vaster than me. The other way, fiat? To me says ‘I am master of the world’. Respect the world and it respects you.”
Mike smiled a little. “That’s what I wanted to be, a long time ago, the master of the world. Some days, I still wake up with that in mind.”
Kael nodded slowly. “I think either way can gain mastery of the world. One by overpowering it, one by undertstanding it.” Kael stood up. “Use your magic so it’s fluid, as effective, but expressed in a way hard to see, hard to sense, and as effective. that, Mike, is -power-.” He offered his hands to Mike to help him up.
“Mind if you take the day learning to ride a bike, love? Roeland can take you.”
“I can ride a bike.” He thought for a minute. “Bicycle?”
Kael grinned “Dirt bike. Get some thumping, vibrating horsepower between your legs and master it, Mike.”
Mike laughed and hugged his lover tightly.
#
Mike took one look at the bike and shook his head. The thing looked like it was made of a chassis and two wheels with very, very sharp spokes. It was green, and old, and looked ready to fall apart at the first brake. It looked like it had good shocks.
“You expect me to ride this?”
Roeland said, “You do not know how?”
“It’s bigger than my ten-speed, that’s for sure. Just show me how.”
“Get on.”
“No, it’s easier if you show me.” Mike knew he was a visual learner.
Roeland climbed on and showed him the clutch, brake, gears, and ignition. “I will show you how to start it with only the clutch later. ” He got off. “Now you try.”
Mike started it fine and went through the same motions Roeland did to get used to the gears. They seemed fluid to him.
“Put it in the lowest gear,” said Roeland.
Mike did. “Ease off the clutch , give gas…that’s it…a little more…” Before Mike knew it, he was in motion down the lane and into the grass. This is easy, he thought as he took turns, gave gas, downshifted and gained speed.
Then something ran across his path. He slammed on the brake and started falling forward as he kept up momentum but the bike didn’t. At the same time he made a motion with his hand to fly. For about a minute, he was suspended in the air as he heard someone yell his name. No blatant magic! he thought dismissing the spell and falling the two feet or so to land on the soft grass with a thump.
Roeland ran up to him. “Are you all right?”
The bike was still running, lying on its side about four meters away. “Yeah, I’m ok.”
Roeland looked from him to the bike. Mike got up. “Let me try that again.” He took Kael’s advice to heart. Instead, if he was falling sideways he let himself drop, but if it was ass-over-handlebars, he flew for a moment, letting the momentum carry him and his own magic flight assist him, so that he would still “fall” but much more gracefully and with a lot less pain.
He rode around then he pulled up next to Roeland, and the sun was at high noon. “Think I got it?”
Roeland nodded once. “You may go get something to eat or drink.”
Proudly, Mike dismounted, tripped, and fell.
#
The rest of the day went by quietly. Mike did not go chase after Kael again, but entertained himself watching the farm, petting the sheep and horses, and just keeping himself out of the way. Two of the buildings were where farmhands slept, and he was caught a couple of times by Roeland watching the farmhands. “Do not study them so intently,” Roeland said gently to him once. “They are like wild horses, and will not trust you.”
In the afternoon Kael returned early from whatever he was doing. Kael had told him he was going to be training, meditating, and the like, and Mike had seen what happened Sunday. He didn’t want to get in the way. .
He retreated to the kitchen near dinner. There, he drank a lot of tea (one sip of that horrid coffee and Mike knew to avoid it) and learned how to cook some simple Turkish meals like ?ç pilav, kabobs of all types (mostly lamb), and so much bread, both leavened and unleavened.
Kael returned and the two of them ate with the group again, after the hands had eaten. Dinner was hearty, and he blushed when the cooks mentioned that Mike had helped. Kael put an arm around his shoulders, and Mike felt a swell of pride. They retired to bed, and Mike didn’t ask any more, but enjoyed now being in the man’s arms, knowing he wasn’t a succubus, or a demon, or any strange creature with human form. Just a lucky man. Mike thought that he was the lucky one.
#
Mike felt someone touch him gently out of sleep, and heard a quiet, “Off to spar.”
Mike mumbled something incoherent and fell back into a doze. He thought about following, but he chose to wait until closer to dawn. Mike thought about it in this way: If Kael showed up and he was in the middle of something really complicated, he could be a distraction, even without meaning to be. So Mike lay in bed, and got up a couple of hours later. He stopped in the kitchen, got another wrap (which he was going to learn how to make, they were so good), and another thermos of coffee (which was too strong for him).
It was that moment of twilight, when night became dawn, that Mike found himself on the moonlit path up the mountain. Again, the swords sang with each other, and he smiled, listening. He waited until dawn crested the horizon before hurrying up to the plateau where the white stones were. It was only Kael. He hadn’t wanted to be there when the spirit was there – this was Kael’s time and he should be allowed to have it alone.
“Mike,” Kael said with a smile. Mike offered him the thermos of coffee. Kael held up a bottle of water. “For now, while we spar.”
Mike hadn’t expected to spar, but put everything down to go do it anyway. The man was tireless, he thought, as he took the two blades that were offered to him, one short for the left hand, one long for the right. He saluted, and the two went at it. Kael started to press. “Remember what I said about magic. Try to be natural.”
“Natural,” Mike said, parrying. He stepped to the side, back pedaling for a distracted moment. Instead of working against the environment, work with it; instead of creating something out of nothing, flow with it.
Flow with it.
Mike could sense the energy here, similar to a ley line but not quite; something that didn’t belong to him so he couldn’t necessarily take it, but he could follow along with it. As Kael glided with the sword, Mike let him in, and the parry came so fluidly that he himself didn’t expect it. The tone that hit was pure. Both men looked at each other and smiled.
“Again,” said Kael, and started in again, steadily increasing the attack. Part of Mike wanted to resort back to the dark magic, to pull the darkness, but he forced himself, consciously, to stay in the moment, to flow with it; to know that eventually something would come around – Kael opened himself up, a minuscule bit, and Mike dove in with all his strength. Kael stepped sideways, letting him in, and parrying him gently away, making him fall forward.
Mike took the fall but rolled over, swords up and defensive as Kael chopped down. Clang – another perfect tone.
Mike suddenly laughed. “I did it.”
“You can do it, love,” said Kael proudly.
As the two left the sacred place, Mike knew he could make the magic flow without being magic.
#
“Yeah, he sent me over again,” Mike said, looking down at the bike. However, this time Roeland had his own.
Roeland said, in his quiet way, “Today we will ride in harder places. You will follow me.”
Mike took a deep breath and started the bike. He put it in the right gears, and Roeland took off in a sputter of dirt. Mike did the same, the bike went sideways, but he barely righted it, using an additional push of magic against gravity, so that his weight was on the correct side of the bike and it straightened up.
Where Roeland kept bringing him was down cowpaths full of potholes. He went into the woods at one point, and Mike had to do all he could to keep the bike straight. For all intents and purposes, he looked like he knew what he was doing. But he was half-panicked and was constantly using magic to keep himself and the bike upright, whispering “flot” every time he was unintentionally airborne.
They came back around to the farmhouse, and Kael was there this time, again smiling. “How is he doing?”
“Better than most,” said Roeland. “He learns fast.”
Mike beamed. Kael said to Roeland, “Let me try.” First he checked the gas in the tank, nodded, then moved backwards a little bit, to be parallel with Mike. Kael reached out, punched Mike in the arm saying, “Tag, you’re it!” And raced off.
Mike stalled out the first time he tried to get going, so by the time he was moving, Kael was far ahead. Mike laughed; he could catch him. Kael would stop, and just as he was getting close enough, take off, veering into different directions. They went through the woods again, this time at a blinding speed, and Mike was hard pressed to not get off the bike and fly after him. Instead he stayed on the bike, and made the bike speed up.
They escaped the woods and were heading toward the barn. Kael was going to go headfirst into the barn itself, Mike sensed this. He dove right in to follow – then Kael turned left, and skidded sideways. Mike didn’t stop, going right past him, into the barn. He dodged a man, dodged a horse, but didn’t dodge an open door, and the bike slammed into it. He flew over it, tucked himself in, half flying, and rolled to the ground, coming up standing. The bike had shut the door, skidded across the floor, and Mike barely jumped out of its way as it careened out the back door, sliding to a stop at the edge of the pasture.
Then the shakes happened, and he knelt on the ground as Kael rode up to him. He put both palms down on the ground, searching for calm here. He found it in Kael’s touch on his shoulder. “Mike?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.”
The other farmhands came over to see to him, and one of them righted the bike. The front wheel was bent, but the fork looked fine. Mike said with a small grin, “I think it’s time for a break.”