Lingua Aeterna

Chapter 8

Helea, Invasion Day

The rumors had already spread throughout the city that something was not only amiss but was dreadfully wrong. The alchemists, those with false magic, had fled the city in the previous week, taking with them their stores of herbs and small medicines. The Clay-Throwers had gone too but long before that, leaving the parts of the city completely empty. While the Heleans had been warned to find shelter or flee, there were so many who remained within the city walls that, due to the lack of food available in the market, families were beginning to starve. The farmers, bread makers, fishmongers, and even the butcher had all gone. All that remained were those who had some grand feeling of loyalty to their city and those who simply had nowhere else to go.
"The children haven't returned, Eleas," Cleànna said to me from the window. "The preceptor would have released them from study. And Miera. She should have been back from the Council-house by now."
Ours was a fine home that was granted to us by the Guardian herself and it had stood, elevated off of the cobblestone street, for three generations before mine. While we might have gone to one of the forest villages for safety, I had been one of the foolish men who had made the decision to stand with the Council against what we had come to call the Dark Army. I'd even insisted on keeping my children to their normal schedule—their education in both magic and the every day elements of this world were important. The preceptor to whom I had paid a handsome fee to remain in the city was forced to believe as much as well.
"The preceptor does not listen to rumor, Cleà. They are all likely still at work," I told her.
"Eleas—"
We had been inundated with a strange set of sounds over the previous days and the noise, to me, was indescribably harsh. One such sound screamed and screeched through the street, seemingly stealing away Cleànna's voice as she meant to plead with me to go and find our children. She bent and covered her ears as the screeching swept past our home. We could hear the sound again a few moments later, but it was as if the makeup of the noise had changed entirely.
"It's happening, Eleas. They will come here today," said Cleànna.
I didn't want to believe her, but she did have an uncanny gift that went beyond any magical ability she had inherited. She could give life back to anything that grew, even if it was dried to a fragile husk. She could bring water into the soil from the deepest spot it had drifted. She could—and perhaps it was simply my imagination—make the sun shine more brightly. But above all of these gifts, she honored her belief that she could know precisely when someone she loved was in danger. The Guardian would say that it was simply a mother's intuition and not magic, but Cleànna would argue that it was just another one of her gifts.
"I'll go," I told her, not bothering to argue one word against her premonition. I went to her at the window and turned her toward me. "I'll find them and I'll bring them here."
"No. Not here," she said. "The Guardian will know what to do. The Guardian will keep us safe."

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The streets were empty and even for the time of day it was odd that I met not a single soul on the cobblestones as I made my way to the academy. It wasn't far from our home but it did stand out among the structures around it, so while I could see the second level, I was still quite far from reaching it. The screeching sound returned, swooping over my head moments before a more terrible sound came from the academy. I looked up again in time to see the roof of the north tower collapse inward.
"No!" I heard myself scream  as my feet pounded against the stones. I desperately wondered how it could be that I was still so far away from them, as if the building was being pulled further from me the more ground I thought I had gained.
Another round of the strange screeching dared to take my attention and I could discern a few differences in the patterns the noise made. I rounded the corner that brought our street to an end in front of what had been the southern market. A crater in the stones, fresh and still cloudy with dust and brought down the main canopy and left the permanent stalls there in complete shambles. I could only pass by as I turned toward the academy with a stumbling skip, my feet at odds with my current goal and the loyalty I felt for my city. Of course, it was my honor, my duty, to help protect the city, though I was hardly ever needed and certainly for nothing like this. But roofs and city markets could be rebuilt.
There in the street ahead of me was the first casualty I came upon, though I was sure that I would find more. An older man who had a full beard of white lay under a pile of the rubble that had tumbled from the side of one building. I paused only a moment to assess if the man was still able to be saved, but the injuries to his face that I could see instantly told me that he was with whatever gods he had followed. Not even my gift could have saved him.
As I dragged my feet to order once again, I remembered that the man had been called Silamar and he was well known to practice with some of the oldest magic. Even taken completely off-guard, Silamar should have been able to protect himself. I wondered if there was another body under the rubble who Silamar had tried to save.
The entry to the academy had long been adorned with a garden that would rival even one belonging to the most skilled among us. It was true that the students of the academy spent much of their time honing skills there, but seeing the fallen trees and rows upon rows of vegetables and herbs that looked as if they'd been dead for seven seasons, an outsider would never have guessed how beautiful it once was. I raced through over stepping stones that had before been packed in among mosses and low ferns but were now upheaved and broken. Flying up the stairs to the main door, my heart was in pieces as I imagined the destruction I would find inside. There were no signs—sounds or otherwise—that the attacks on the academy were continuing, and, save for the sound of broken pieces of roof or wall falling, the entire academy was as silent as a boneyard.
"Shain!" I called for my daughter first. She was the smallest. I imagined her gray eyes searching for help. "Narein!" His name echoed in the empty hall and each syllable seemed to come back to me like a slap.