Mantle: The Return of the Sha (4 page)

“I beg of you to pardon my intrusion, Majesty. I come to you on this night with counsel that you might take with you for the remainder of your journey. Will you hear the advice that I have to offer?”

Naturally, Zander was taken aback by the blunt offer of assistance from the oracle, but also by the oracle’s appearance as he removed the hood of his cloak. The oracle was well known throughout the kingdom, but was rarely seen by anyone. Generally, the oracle would provide assistance under cover of darkness or in complete disguise, whether by way of magic or some other means. Additionally, the oracle would only choose to provide counsel to those Fories whose afflictions or needs were of such a nature that a remedy was necessary to assure the prosperity of the kingdom—or, in some cases, an entire village or large number of Fories. His advice was never to strengthen just one individual.

Now the king stood before the oracle, who was uncloaked and unhidden from him. He appeared so old that Zander could hardly make out the whites of his eyes because they were so deeply sunken into his face. His face was covered in deep wrinkles and dark liver spots. Long white hair disappeared beneath his cloak, and where Zander would expect to see an equally long beard, there was none. Not a whisker on the old man could be seen.

Oracles were known to be shape-shifters, and while this was never confirmed as a truth or a myth, Zander was nonetheless surprised to find that he was being visited in such a bold way.

“Oracle, it is my honor to receive you this night. But, I must ask…why have you come to me in such a manner as this?”

“Majesty, you have offered yourself no choice but to appear to your people as you truly are. Therefore, I come to you now unaltered and as I truly am. Does my appearance frighten you?”

“No, oracle, it does not. Your appearance here tonight is most welcome in whatever fashion you should see fit. But, as you are surely aware, your visit to me is highly unusual—some might even say scandalous.”

“You need not worry yourself with that, Majesty, for I have consulted with the trees and they have agreed that my counsel is necessary for the greater good of the kingdom. It was hoped that you would have found answers on your own. However, it has become clear now that you have managed to worsen your condition and have created a circle of sadness within yourself.”

“It is true, oracle, that I have become increasingly frustrated with my inability to find happiness in such places as this, where joy is so abundant and visible for all to see. Any assistance you can offer in this matter will be most appreciated, and I can repay you in whatever manner you see fit.”

“My king, I will accept no payment for my service. The only debt that you will owe will be to your subjects, for they deserve a king who can convey the happiness that they all wish for themselves.”

“I understand, oracle. What advice can you offer that will assist me in banishing this horrible curse that I have brought upon myself?”

“Majesty, you are born from a long line of great rulers, each of which carried a heavy concern for the happiness of the people of Forris. Even your ancestor, King Reginald, who fought the Great Mantle War, was of such compassion that he wept daily for the sorrows that the war brought to his subjects and to the other kingdoms of Mantle. While this is certainly a noble attitude to have as king, it does not come without a cost.

“You see, the curse that you have brought upon yourself is but a byproduct of a deeper flaw. Your lineage has made you into a perfectionist of sorts. Although you will make every attempt to please all of your subjects, you are not skilled in handling your own mistakes when doing so.

“When you speak to an audience, you are more careful than most not to offend or alienate a single Forie. Likewise, when you are engaged in some great negotiation, you are burdened with a desire to make all parties as equally happy as the others. This approach, my king, is not a realistic one.”

Zander sat down near the window and shook his head in confusion. “But how can it be a flaw that I wish happiness for every one of my people? Is it not a good thing for me to desire that all Fories live a peaceful and joyful life?”

“No, Majesty, it is not such a good thing when your expectations do not fall in line with the realities of the world. Not all people can be content all of the time. And furthermore, you cannot hold yourself to such a high standard and carry such a heavy guilt for the mistakes that you might make as king. You are not infallible; you are destined to falter just as everyone else in Forris, or in all of Mantle, for that matter.”

“But how can I fix my current affliction?” Zander asked, now becoming frustrated with the oracle, who wasn’t telling him anything that he didn’t already know. “I have not allowed myself to smile in all these many years and I’m not sure that I can even remember what it is like to express joy. I have forgotten it completely.”

“My young king, you must let go—that is all,” the oracle said, smiling slightly. “First, you should be aware that the error you made was with the Sovereign Trees. And while the trees do reside within the Kingdom of Forris, you should remember that they are not your subjects—you are
theirs
. The trees will not fret over whether or not you are content or happy. They do not worry themselves with such matters. They will only become concerned with your wellbeing if and when it affects the kingdom as a whole. They are part of this kingdom, and therefore are directly affected by its prosperity or failure. They have forgiven you long ago and you would be wise to find it within yourself to do the same.”

“But how, oracle?” Zander asked. Again, the oracle was not giving him new information, and his frustration was now mixed with anger and sorrow. He forced back tears of hopelessness.

“Your journey is not over yet. You will find that thing you are looking for. That thing which will force you out of your misery. I cannot tell you how to recognize it when you find it, though. I can only tell you that it will come, and although you will not forget your error with the trees, you will find a new perspective. You will understand your error for what it truly is…a mistake, not unlike the mistakes that men have been making since the beginning of time. You
will
have your burden lifted.”

At this revelation, Zander sighed with great relief. He still couldn’t imagine what
thing
he might come across that would lift his curse, but he felt better nevertheless.

“Majesty, your only hope is to release yourself from the worry of never finding happiness. If you do not bring yourself out of despair for not finding that thing that will overjoy you, then you will never recognize it for what it is. Remove the veil of sadness that you carry, so that you might see the joy that is presenting itself.”

With that, Zander then understood how he had been making matters worse. He had been so obsessed with finding happiness that he had made himself miserable. He had traveled through dozens of villages, been presented with gifts of remarkable value and with the greatest sincerity, and yet he had overlooked all of it simply because he was too preoccupied with his despair and frustration.

“Why do you come to me now, oracle, in this place and at this time? I have traveled for months now in my search. Surely, this is advice that I could have found useful from the beginning.”

“You are on the verge of your discovery, my king. It became clear that without some guidance, you might not see the thing that is so important—not only important to
you
, but also to the many people of this kingdom.”

“So I will find it on this journey?”

“Yes, Majesty, you will find it soon. But I cannot tell you in what form it will take. That is something that only you will know when you find it.”

The oracle turned toward the door as he lifted the hood of his cloak.

“I must take my leave now,” the oracle said as he opened the door. “Know that the people of Forris love you deeply and hope only the best for you.”

“Thank you, oracle, for your service and your counsel. It will not be forgotten.”

With that, the oracle left Zander alone in his room, and for the first time in a very long time, Zander was excited. He was excited because he now knew that all hope was not lost, and that he could soon return to being the man that he knew he was. He felt like a weight had been lifted. The oracle was right; he wasn’t perfect and he should not think of himself in that way. He was allowed mistakes just as any other man in the world, and he now understood that what was important was that he correct his errors as they occurred, not obsess about them. No, he wasn’t perfect, and realizing this actually made him quite content. And although he still could not release a smile on his face, he felt as though his mind were open to receiving the warmth and love that his subjects had been more than willing to offer. For the first time he could imagine expressing his joy.

The next morning King Zander awoke with the energy of two men. He couldn’t remember the last time he had slept such a deep and peaceful sleep. It was a new day with newfound optimism.

The Darkness of Balki

IF ONE WERE TO DESCRIBE the people of Forris, kindness and an abundance of honesty would come to mind. Generally, the people of Forris did not commit crimes against each other, but instead might have what most would describe as quarrels or disputes. These disputes would typically be of an innocent nature: border disagreements, damage caused by loose livestock and so forth. But for the most part, people did not intentionally break royal decrees or regulations that had been handed down by the councils of the various villages.

So when Tate and Doalie Touro had given birth to a son in the village of Maske nearly two decades earlier, nothing was thought of it. Everyone in the village celebrated, as was customary, and no one suspected that the young boy might one day become a grave threat to the kingdom. But Tate Touro secretly knew that their son might indeed become the thing that he and other Fories were unaccustomed to.

Tate had been advised many years earlier by the oracle that it would not be wise to have children. He was told that his ancestors had been cursed by the Skites during the Mantle War centuries earlier. Tate’s ancestor, Barth, had acted as a spy for the Fories during the war and was found out by the Skites, who were known to practice the dark magic of Mantle. He was chosen for his mission due to his ability to cloak himself in such a manner that he would easily pass as a Skite ally and remain undetected as a spy.

The gift of cloaking was so rare in Mantle that, for a long while, even the dark magic of the Skites did not detect his deception. And his ability was so powerful that he not only could cloak how he appeared to the enemy, but could also conceal his ability to change form in the first place.

Eventually he was found out by the Skites, though, and imprisoned in the dungeons deep in the belly of Mount Narciss.

His penetration into the Skite Kingdom was so damaging that the Skite king eventually blamed the loss of the war, in part, on Barth’s meddling. They determined that in order to inflict long-lasting damage to the Fories and secure revenge for Barth’s spying, they would curse his children, and
their
children—and so on. At the time of his capture, Barth had no children and so he was lightly guarded by his captors and set up for an easy escape from his prison. Of course, it was the intention of the Skites all along that he should escape so that he could return to Forris and produce children, who would eventually carry his curse.

It was intended that Barth’s children would each carry a dark soul. And although they would appear as though they were wholesome and decent Fories, they would carry evil within them, hidden from notice.

But a strange thing happened. Barth’s children became very loving and caring Fories. They inherited none of their father’s dark curse. Likewise, none of their children did either. And so it appeared as though the curse either never took effect because of the good nature of Barth himself, or was not properly administered by the Skites to begin with. Barth never knew that he had been cursed at all; otherwise, he would never have allowed his children to enter the world in the first place. But he did not know of such things and mistakenly accounted for his escape as skill and training on his part—not the elaborate hoax that it truly was.

Since Barth was regarded as a hero once the war was won, he and his descendants became a prominent and noble family highly regarded by the Fories, as well as each of the monarchs that ruled over the years. Although the status that Barth had won had been long forgotten, his descendants continued to live with a good reputation. It was not unusual for a reigning monarch to appoint members of the Touro family to such highly regarded positions as royal ambassadors or councillors.

Tate Touro himself had been offered an appointment as ambassador to the Sovereign Trees by the newly crowned King Zander—just as Tate’s father had been offered the appointment by King Alexo before him. It was a top position that he reluctantly turned down in order to spend more time at home with Doalie to focus on producing children of their own.

Since declining the king’s offer to become ambassador, he was quickly nominated by the village council to become mayorgovern of the village of Maske. Mayorgovern was a much lower position, but Tate accepted the nomination and was unopposed in the subsequent election of the village council.

****

Having children turned out to be a challenge, though. Doalie did not become pregnant as expected, and as time went by they both grew to resent one another, each blaming their childless misfortune on the other. They became so disenchanted with each other that, when Doalie finally became pregnant, they were both lost in deep anger and sadness. They never showed it, however, and perhaps they didn’t even suspect their own bitterness themselves. But it was there just beneath the surface all the same.

The oracle, having foreseen that a child of Tate and Doalie might be different from the other Touros of the past, felt it necessary to issue a warning to Tate not to have children. Tate was so distraught with the advice that he kept the secret to himself, never speaking a word of it to anyone—least of all his wife. Not only did he desire children in order to carry on his name, he also knew that his wife wanted children desperately. He reasoned that, while the oracle was to be taken seriously, he was not infallible and could be wrong in his prediction.

So when Doalie finally became pregnant, they celebrated. And when she bore the child and they had named him Balki, they celebrated once again.

Although he thought of the oracle’s warning often in the beginning, as time went by Tate forced himself to forget what he had said. He saw no signs that his son was evil in any way. In fact, he was one of the kindest young men in the village, always eager to assist others and often engaged in local affairs. It seemed clear that he would follow in his father’s footsteps one day to become a great leader of Forris.

****

At a young age, Balki exhibited all of the gifts of his father. He was a very skilled watercall and had the gifts of both Bird-speak and Animal-speak. He even carried some skill in windmaking, which was something he had inherited from his great-great-grandfather. Gifts of magic were generally inherited, so it was no surprise that he would garner some magic from older ancestors.

What was not known, however, was that Balki had another gift he had inherited from his ancestors. This gift was another ability that he had received from his father’s side—he had the ability to cloak.

The ability to cloak was something he kept hidden from others. It was a skill that could prove extremely useful, but it was also considered to be highly suspect and even dangerous.

Balki had not inherited an ability to cloak himself physically, as Barth had, but he could cloak himself to alter the way others
felt
about him while in his presence. He could disguise his words in a way that the person listening would trust him wholeheartedly and without doubt. He could appear as though the words he spoke were in a person’s best interest, even though it might be clear they were not. Even without speaking, a person might feel safe and trusting while in his company.

It was a dangerous ability that hadn’t been seen in Forris for generations, and the prospect that someone could so easily manipulate others would be terrifying to the Fories.

So Balki did not speak of it—but he certainly did
use
it. In fact, he used it often. Balki was born with a hunger for power and, fortunate for him, he had not only been born into a family where power and trust were received openly, but also with an ability to cloak himself in order to gain even more power.

No, he was not the son that his father believed him to be and he deceived everyone. Now the king was scheduled to arrive, and Balki had plans. They were not elaborate plans, though; Balki had also been born with patience.

He intended to do only one thing on the day of the king’s arrival, and that was to simply plant a seed. He would introduce himself to King Zander and make his mark with him. By the time Balki had gotten his several minutes with the king, he would have instilled such an unwavering trust in him that, although Zander would be blind to the reason, he would see Balki as an up-and-coming adviser who should be trusted and consulted.

That would certainly make sense to those around the king. There would be nothing suspicious or out of the ordinary. He was a Touro, after all, and the Touro family was known for their loyalty. Now the king would have Balki in his head and would not be able to let go of him.

Balki’s ability to cloak was not the only weapon in his arsenal. There was something else even more dangerous to the people of Forris and the whole of Mantle.

Balki himself was unaware of a dark power that he carried with him—hung around his neck. He was unwittingly the carrier of an
inflock,
an extension of the spirit of Menagraff, the Skite king. An inflock hadn’t been known in Forris (or anywhere else in Mantle) since the defeat of the Skites during the Great Mantle War, and so no one in Forris would ever think to look for one, or be suspicious that they hadn’t gone extinct along with the Skites at the conclusion of the war.

This isn’t to say that they could be easily spotted. An inflock could possess any object of its choosing, and it was the Skites who had perfected the making of objects that the inflock would desire. This particular inflock was hidden in a hollowed gold medallion. During the medallion’s creation, it had been filled with the powdered bones taken from the enemies of the now long-defeated Kingdom of Skite. This included the bones and tears of Fories and their allies.

Balki’s ancestor, Barth, had taken it from a Skite soldier during his escape. He would not have even considered removing it from the dead man’s chest, but it had called to him and he could not refuse—
it had been created especially for him
. This was yet another piece of the Skites’ elaborate and long-reaching plan to seek revenge on the three allied kingdoms of Mantle.

****

For hundreds of years the inflock, along with the medallion, had been handed down through generations. It was passed along to each firstborn son by his father. In Balki’s case, his father, Tate Touro, had passed it to him on his eighteenth birthday.

For centuries, the inflock had slept quietly, never producing its influence, until Balki arrived. None of its former possessors had been so hungry for power, so indifferent to the lives of those who might oppose him, so the inflock had not the strength to do its advising or set the owner’s mind on a path of evil. The previous owners had all been kindhearted and simply too
good
by nature.

It was when Balki had been born, finally bearing the unfortunate curse of the Skites, that the inflock began to awaken. Its awakening would be a slow one, though. The inflock had been weakened by time, but even more so by the purity of its previous owners.

So it woke slowly, feeding off the negative and evil nature of Balki and gaining strength little by little. Now, with Balki about to carry out his plans, the inflock had silently begun to stir.

****

When King Zander arrived in Maske, he had a feeling of optimism. After all, there was only one other village to visit after Maske and the oracle had told him that all hope to regain his smile was not lost.

The village of Maske was on the outer edges of Forris, nearly four days’ journey from the nearest neighboring village. It had been many years since the king had visited Maske, and even then it had only been for a short visit and he had been young. At the time, his father, King Alexo, had put in place a plan to re-establish the Forris armory, and Maske was known for its creation of the finest metals in all of Forris. The village was established just outside of the Forie Mines, where every conceivable metal and precious gem could be found.

It was the Spiers who did metal conjuring for the Maskes. They were the small folk who lived in the caves of the mountains overlooking the village. Not more than four feet in height, the Spiers would cast their spells over the mines so that precious materials would simply rise up from the rocks and dirt.

This was not a gesture made by the Spiers to simply please the neighboring Maskes. Their services were sold to the Maskes for such items as food, tools, and other necessities. And often they would also require such luxury items as rugs, tapestries, and jewelry.

While the Spiers were very skilled at managing the mountain and the mines, they possessed absolutely no skills in crafting tools, or creating objects with any artistic value. Their world was a world of caves and rocks, and so being surrounded by the color of gray they claimed no sense of creativity whatsoever.

In return for these items, though, the Maskes could simply walk into the mines, collecting iron ore, gold, silver, sapphires, and diamonds at their leisure. It was a good agreement between the two communities, since each one had something of value that the other wanted. Since the Spiers had access to precious metals and gems at all times, without the skills to properly use them, they considered the treasure worthless and gave no thought to its actual value. And since the Maskes (thanks to the Spiers) had unlimited access to the materials for making such items for the Spiers, they too, thought that they were getting the better end of the bargain.