Jack Linch leaned against the cold stone wall and stared at nothing. The darkness covered him like a cold, wet, blanket. He didn't move and kept his eyes only partway open. The familiar aches and pains of his trapped and cramped body were the only things keeping him semiconscious. He found it interesting that he thought more about going after those who took his freedom than he did about freedom itself. No thoughts came to his mind about how to break free. He had no wild plans about getting out of this massive fortress turned prison.
How he escaped didn't matter. He would get out. He would get out because there were people out there that he needed to punish. Oh yes, he would not let them get away with what they had done to him. Fate wasn't done with him. This was not how Jack Linch died.
Abruptly his scalp began to itch terribly. He reached up with a pale, clammy hand and scratched it ferociously. It was almost feeding time. The routine was as solid as the walls and he could tell by the level of hunger he felt how close he was to being fed. Although by now he had been living on so little for so long that hunger pains were only a pale imitation of what they had once been. Curse this filthy place. Indignation crackled down his spine and brought clarity through the haze.
The door opened suddenly. The familiar old man with his cart hobbled in to take Jack's bowl. The two bored looking guards stood at either side. Jack stared up at each one of them with a look of raw hate. The guards wore slightly rumpled uniforms, neither one looked any better than a hired thug. Discipline, it seemed, was not all encompassing in Calchas Prison. The old man returned the bowl and glanced at Jack's slop bucket; it was nearly empty as always.
These three throwbacks from society were the jailers of the great Jack Linch. Rage burned inside him with such intensity that for a split second the haze that clouded his vision and mind, the haze he had lived with for ten years, lifted. For a moment everything seemed to come into sharp focus. With an effort he forced it down deep inside him once again. Better to conserve it and keep it for when he was ready to use it. There was no need to lift himself from his monotonous delirium, not today, not yet.
His hate he had with him always. His rage though, his rage he cultivated and kept in check for the day when he would release it. He crawled to his bowl slurped up the contents without enjoyment or gusto. The bowl had more in it than usual but Jack hardly cared. Then, as he continued to consume the contents, his tongue touched on something hard and round. Some spiteful old cook had apparently thought it would be humorous to toss a rock into his soup. One day he would kill that man, and the wretch that brought the soup, and the two guards.
Jack reached his hand into the bowl to pull out the rock and toss it aside. But as his bony fingers closed around it he felt something, something he hadn't felt for more than ten years. His eyes widened and he held it up for closer inspection. Even in the darkness it shimmered, like a piece of glass...or a gemstone.
It couldn't be.
Experimentally he began to concentrate, reaching deep within himself to his repressed rage. Long ago it had been second nature to call forth his magic, but after all this time perhaps it was lost forever.
Then, like finding a grain of in a stream, he rediscovered the power within himself. It filled his entire body with an electrifying intensity. The gemstone in his hand, a ruby, began to glow blood red, lighting up the darkened cell. His senses came alive and his eyes blinked with sudden, inescapable, clarity.
Tears came to his eyes as raw power flowed through his body. He had almost forgotten what it was like. A slow smile came to his face as, for a few moments, he just stood there taking in the moment. The ruby in his hand glowed brighter, like a captured star. The aches of his body drifted away. He felt reborn and alive; the years of imprisonment seemed to fall from him like beads of sweat.
Slowly, the embers of rage within him burst into a glorious inferno. He raised his chained hands and burning red lightning lanced from his body. His manacles melted from him into shards of twisted scrap. With a howl of unbridled fury he sent a wave of burning red fire into his cell door smashing it to burning splinters. He stepped from his former cage and into the hallway he had walked through only once before in ten long years.
His rage boiled within him, and his red magic fed on it growing in power and intensity. A red light began to emanate from his skin and his eyes glowed like living coals. The two guards that had been so bored moments before froze in shock as he approached. His face twisted into a sadistic grin and he sent a wave of red fire soaring down the hallway. The guards stopped and stood for a split second, eyes wide with terror, and then exploded into ashes and meat as a red wave burned through them. Jack Linch stormed down the hallways of his former prison. Doors and guards alike were ripped into burning shards as he made his way through.
A small group of about five guards stood with crossbows raised and waiting at the top of the stairs. They fired simultaneously only to watch the crossbow bolts incinerate a few inches before hitting the creature before them. Jack Linch laughed and hurled red lightning at four of them tearing them into flaming bits of ash, blackened bones clattered against the wall. Then, as the fifth turned to run, Jack gestured sharply and the man was suspended screaming into the air. Squirming and howling, the unfortunate guard floated over in front of the sorcerer.
Jack Linch regarded him. His heartbeat pounded in his ears, his vision tinged with red. The man stopped screaming momentarily. Jack spoke to the man, his voice changed by his magic to the sound of a roaring fire.
"Tell me the fastest way out," he said.
The guard sputtered directions, trembling terribly as he hung suspended in the air. Jack nodded and gestured again, this time the guard burst into flame and fell screaming to the ground. Jack Linch left him writhing on the floor and made his way through Calchas prison, the prison that all thought was impregnable. He kept following the stairs up. The directions he had received from the guard drifted faintly through his mind, but he was too saturated with rage and power to worry too much about where he was going. It didn't matter. He had the magic back.
He was invincible.
He came to a hallway that dead-ended into a solid stonewall. The only way to go was back down. What had that guard said again? Tasting bile in his throat, he threw his magic at the wall. The stone surface cracked and blackened but remained solid. Unlike the doors, the walls were many feet thick, built to last a thousand years. But Jack Linch would not let a wall defy him, not with his magic burning inside his ribcage.
He unleashed wave after wave of burning red fire into the wall, but the wall remained firm against the onslaught. Finally, Jack reached deep within himself and hurled everything he had into the wall before him in one sustained torrent of churning fire. The stone glowed red then white hot and a man sized hole opened up in the center. The magic melted through the wall like a hot blade through a piece of wax. The rock steamed and sizzled blackening and slowly cooling. Molten lava trickled out the outside of the opening and down the mountain into which Calchas prison was built. Jack wrapped himself in his own magic and slipped through the hole.
Free at last he took a breath and started down the mountainside. But as he walked, his magic suddenly began to leave his control. He staggered over a rock jutting out from the slope.
As his magic withdrew sharp pains stabbed into his joints and his lungs. Total exhaustion overwhelmed him and he collapsed onto his face and lost consciousness. His last thought was not of his first breath of free air in ten years. It was of the one who had stripped his magic from him, a man named Abdiel.
***
Jack awoke to feeling himself being jostled. His eyes snapped open but, bereft of his magic flowing through him, the sunlight that had been locked away from him for ten long years burned his unsuspecting eyes. He winced and closed them again. Then opened them again only slightly. It still hurt, but the pain was bearable, and he wanted to see what was going on. A brutal headache stabbed into his forehead. His body felt drained and broken. He shifted in his seat to relieve some of the pain. He was in a carriage and it bumped to one side sending a jolt of pain up his spine. He tried opening his eyes again, seated across from him was a woman.
She was middle-aged and pale; black robes covered all but her face. Her cold black eyes pierced into him and she had a presence about her that suggested she was accustomed to command.
"You have returned to us Master Linch," she said, her voice was as cold as her eyes and sharp with impatience.
Jack closed his eyes again. He tried opening them slowly. Once more the pain was too intense; he closed them again for the third time. The carriage rocked and jostled him. "Who are you?" he asked trying to collect himself.
"I am the reason you are no longer chained in a dungeon. Though had I not come to collect you when I did, your foolish squandering of your magic would no doubt have placed you back into enemy hands and directly to the chopping block."
Jack smiled, but he kept his eyes closed, "So you provided the ruby
"We did," she said.
Still smiling he took a breath and let it out. " We, is it?" he said. "I assume this favor was not done out of the goodness of your heart." A tingling, needlelike feeling spread across his legs and numbness spread across his feet.
"My employer wants you to lead a team in recovering something for him."
At this Jack actually laughed, filling his throat with bile. He choked, sending spasms through his chest and limbs. Sharp pains pierced him in a dozen places yet he still managed to smile.
"What is your name?" he asked.
"You will call me Milady, but I fail to see any humor in what I have told you," she said.
Jack chuckled and coughed, tasting blood. "Take a look at me woman." He grunted. "Take a long look. I can't even open my eyes. Ten years of prison have ruined me; without my magic I could barely have crawled out of my cell had they left the door wide open. I can't lead anything."
"We are taking you to someone who can relieve you of your current handicaps." The cold voice replied. "And if you address me so informally again I shall see if your broken body can survive a horsewhip, is that clear?"
"Yes," he said.
There was a shifting of movement behind him and Jack's head suddenly exploded in pain. He gasped and his whole body tensed at the blow, then he began coughing uncontrollably.
"Yes, what?" asked the cold voice.
"Yes...Milady," choked Jack Linch. Hate and anger welled up within him. This woman would die. He would kill her, but he would discover the mind behind her first.
The journey continued in silence. The carriage rocking up and down as they moved steadily forward, sending jolts of pain right into his bones. Jack's eyes slowly adjusted until he could finally open them enough to get a good look around.
Besides him and Milady there were two other men in the carriage. Both kept completely silent. They wore the black and white tunics of the King's soldiers, but neither carried weapons or armor. They both wore long hair and beards but the striking thing about them was their eyes. Their eyes were an almost yellow green, far brighter than any human eyes Jack had ever seen and both men's eyes were exactly the same. Something was definitely unnatural about these men.
Jack suddenly wished for his ruby. The woman had, apparently, taken it from him after his escape and loss of consciousness. Curse her! For a few glorious moments he had had his power back. Now it was all gone, but she would return his ruby he was sure of it. She, or the one she worked for, needed him and needed his magic.
He was so lost in thought that he nearly cried out in alarm when the carriage suddenly shuddered to a stop. The two green eyed men hopped out. Then the woman leaned close to him,
"This is you only chance Master Linch. I suggest you remember that," she whispered. Then she stepped out lightly. Jack wondered what that was supposed to mean then stepped out himself. His legs protested and he staggered drunkenly. One of the green-eyed men grabbed him with grip like steel and held him steady.
They were in a small clearing surrounded by huge, ancient looking trees. The sun was sinking in the sky and twilight was beginning to settle over the world like a shroud.
In the center of the clearing was a small hut constructed of sticks and stretched animal hides. An ancient looking crone sat in front of it smoking a long thin pipe. A cane lay next to her. She was gnarled and old, most of her hair was gone. Her twisted face bore an expression of boredom, but her beady eyes were watching every move the newcomers made.
Milady walked right up to the crone and looked down at her with an icy stare, "Lista, this is the man I told you about."
The hard beady eyes glanced at Jack again; Lista puffed on her pipe and looked away. He knew what she was. He could feel a crackle in the air around her. She was one of the Hags of Karvain.
"He's too far gone," she murmured.
"We had an agreement," said Milady.
"The man can barely stand," said Lista angrily. She sat her pipe beside her seat in the dirt, "He'll be dead in a year."
Milady turned from Lista, and as she did she reached into her robes. In a single movement she produced an enormous ruby. His ruby. Jack caught his breath and licked his lips, his eyes never leaving the precious gem, but the woman turned her back to him and held the stone in front of Lista whose beady eyes lit up with greed.
Milady smiled and said, "Then I suppose I'll have to take him and this to another hag."
Lista's eyes stayed locked on the ruby. "No, that won't be necessary," she said. "I'll do it. Just know that I'm not making any promises." She reached up for the gem but Milady snatched it away.
"You'll get it after," she said and walked over to Jack. She placed the ruby that was the key to his power into his eager hand. Then she walked past him, ostensibly to wait inside the carriage, but as she passed him she whispered, "Do what you must."
He puzzled over that, his confusion almost as strong as his elation from holding the ruby again.
The crone rose to her feet, seizing her gnarled cane, and hobbled up to him. She was whispering to herself. Whispering the preparations for her healing spell, he realized. Then the mutterings slowly became a song. Her free hand drifted up and down in different patterns as she limped towards him. Jack listened to the song and suddenly everything was clear to him. The old woman was no regular healer and her song was much stronger than any healing song he had ever heard. He kept his own eyes looking down, away from hers.
***
Lista's face was a mask of concentration. Every talent she possessed was being used to perform her healing spell. The hand motions, the song, even the rhythm of her body as she moved gradually towards the ruined husk of a man before her had to be perfect or the spell would break. A sheen of sweat spread across her wrinkled skin. She was, in fact, so caught up in concentration she didn't notice that the ruby, her promised prize, was beginning to glow faintly nor did she notice the red light that began to shine from the eyes of the man she was approaching.
Healing was rarely done by pure magic anymore. Few knew how to use it effectively; most used herbs or alchemy to supplement their own lack of power. However, Lista had been taught all the songs of healing in her time among the Hags. Some songs, like the one she sang now, could be very dangerous to the healer. She was spending the magic that burned inside her in a way that would be difficult to restore. After a normal spell or a different song her magic would replenish itself a couple days, but after this spell the magic she used would take months or years to return.
But what did it matter? A gemstone the size of the ruby would increase whatever powers she possessed tenfold. It would all be worth it.
In a clear high voice she ended the song and placed her hand the chest of the crippled man. She sucked in air sharply as though she had been suddenly immersed in ice water. His physical pains twisted and swirled about her. She saw all his ailments, all the infirmities that crippled his body. Old wounds from hard fought battles that had never fully healed, muscles wasted to nothing from years of captivity and undernourishment, eyes bereft of part of their vision from exposure to direct sunlight after being in darkness for so long, diseases covered his lungs and clung to his heart and liver.
It was a miracle he was alive at all.
She wondered briefly at where some of the battle wounds had occurred, then dismissed her curiosity and began sending tendrils of her magic into various areas, repairing what she could, but there was just so much. It was like trying to put out a hundred wildfires by herself. She paused for a moment staring at the man helplessly.
Suddenly a gleaming bolt of red fire came out of nowhere and wrapped around her. It burned and seared her flesh, and she struggled against it, screaming. Then she felt something inside her begin to vanish. She watched in horror as her magic poured out of her, spreading into the broken body of the man. More and more of her magic bled out; she struggled harder against the red bands that shackled her in place. Too much! She was losing too much!
She felt the great warm glow of power in her chest begin to dim and fade.
Hopeless panic wrenched her insides; she attempted to regain control, to prevent the cruel red bands from siphoning out all her powers, but it was all in vain. She was forced to watch her great power, the thing that defined her entire life, drain away from her and into the body of the cripple.
It seemed like hours that she struggled until finally the burning within her faded completely away. Her physical strength left her and her body went limp against the cords of red magic that held her. She was empty. The red magic drifted away and she fell to the ground. Her body collapsed; she had no more control of herself than an infant. She turned over on her back and began shaking.
***
Jack Linch stretched his lean strong body. He could hardly believe that all his ailments were gone. He had been living with his physical pains for so long he had forgotten what it was like without them. He walked around experimentally his legs felt fit and strong. An excited almost giddy feeling washed through him. He could do anything.
Milady stepped out of the carriage and said, "Now I will explain the details of what you will do for us."
Flexing his hands and arms in wonder Jack Linch followed. Neither he nor his new mistress spared a glance at the creature that lay huddled in the fetal position, sobs shuddering through her body and eyes staring at nothing. Jack, Milady, and the two green-eyed men climbed into the carriage and rode away leaving behind only the shell of the woman they had come to find.