War of the Wisps

“Be quiet,” Charles Ironhill whispered. It was unclear who he was speaking to, with the tavern already in total silence. Still, he grit his teeth and stepped inside. His gaze passed over the room, passing over Anna without seeming to recognize her as out of the ordinary in the room of humans. When it fell back on Andrew he glared. “You interrupted me,” the knight said.

“My apologies,” Andrew managed as one of the patrons helped him to his feet. “You were blocking the door.”

“What are you doing here, Young Lord?” Bart called from the bar.

The knight’s head whipped in the tavern keepers direction. He opened his mouth, snapped it shut, then turned to the room at large. “I will be blunt,” he began. “My Uncle is no longer fit to rule the Iron Valley. He’s old, arrogant, and unable to see that I am ready to take command here. The knights in Belmont are blinded by his words, and he has the rest of Grealand convinced that he is still fit. Not that it’s any business of theirs.”

The knight paused, tilting his head to the side. “I need the aid of the people of the valley to… demonstrate for my uncle and the outsiders that I should be… that I am ready for this role. If you are old enough to carry sword or spear, follow me!”

The villagers looked at one another, a murmur running through them. Bart stepped out from behind the bar. “Sir Charles,” he began. The knight cut him off with a shout.

“It is Lord!”

“Right, erm, milord.” Bart waited a moment, wondering if that would satisfy the young noble. When there was no further outburst, he went on. “When last we’d heard, you’d gone missing. Are you sure you are alright.”

“Do not concern yourself with my health,” Charles said. “Only do as you are told, and follow me.”

“It’s the middle of the night,” called one villager.

“Aye, can’t we discuss this in the morning?”

“And what about our other work?”

“I don’t really fancy fighting old Ironhill. He’s kept out of our way up here.”

“You can’t just walk in making demands, son.”

“Have you tried talking with your uncle about all this?”

Charles spun, looking from one villager to another as they voiced their objections. “Silence!” he yelled. His voice crashed through the place like an avalanche, seeming louder than it should have been. A familiar sensation crept over Anna. A feeling that wasn’t her own. A group of feelings. Fear and rage, all stirred together in a mass of confusion. It fell over her like a blanket, or like water, cutting off her air. Anna grabbed the bracelet she wore and squeezed her eyes shut. A brief sense of respite from the influence flowed into her as a different one slid between her and them. A little blue light appeared in the opal, too small for anyone but her to see.

Only then did Charles begin to glow. Yellow, red, and orange light all began to trail off of him in smoky tendrils. His eyes flashed with light, and five wisps seemed to seep out of his armor. They began drifting around him. One, a deep bloody crimson, floated up around his head. His face contorted in rage. “You are not to defy me!” he said. “I am the rightful master of this valley!”

“Calm down, son!” Bart said.

“Do not call me son!”

“How’s about bastard?” Peter said. The young man stood, arms crossed, eyebrows knit together and jaw set. Anna shuddered. Something about that expression on the carefree youth’s face seemed unnatural to her. Worse, she wasn’t sure if he was giving in to the angry influence of the wisps, or if it was his own true feeling that compelled him.

Charles rotated to look at Peter, moving slowly. The wisps around him continued to shift. The expression on his face changed as the glowing red orb was replaced with pale yellow orange wisp. Charles took a step back. “I see… My uncle has convinced you as well. All are in his thrall. The whole world is against me now.” His voice quavered as he backed away. A third wisp came closest to his head, this one a much brighter yellow, and again his expression shifted. “No. I will not stand for this.”

Peter remained steadfast, with his arms crossed. His expression hadn’t changed. “You need to leave, Ironhill.”

“It is Lord, boy!” The two were staring at one another, now. Villagers moved out of the space between them, as if blown away by a wind, abandoning their places at the tables between. Neither of them moved. Then Andrew did, stepping around Charles and keeping out of reach. He fixed his gaze on the knight as well. “Calm down, Lord Ironhill. Please.”

The light of the wisps seemed to fade for a moment. Charles took a breath in. All five wisps drifted up to his head, the tendrils of light floating off them mingling like a vale. “This will not do,” he said. “They’ve all betrayed me. There is no one. No one to trust. He has all of them in his pocket.” He began to turn, staggering a little. As he did, he bumped one of the empty chairs.

With one arm, he grabbed the seat and hurled the chair across the room, where it exploded into splinters over the bar. Old Bart and Donna had no time to move. They cried out as chips of wood from the chair and wall sprayed against them. The knight didn’t appear to have noticed.

The woodsman Jonas stood, moving to help the tavernkeeper and shaking with rage. “I don’t care if you are a nobleman, you can’t treat—” Charles struck the big man as he passed. The blow was almost casual, and the woodsman was broader than the knight, and nearly a head taller. Still, the strike sent Jonas reeling into the other patrons. The big man wheezed as he fell against a table. The rest of the villagers scrambled away.

Charles turned and stumbled to the door, mumbling, “…must find a way. Make them follow. Take back my rights.” The door slammed behind him as he left.

“Jonas!” Andrew and Peter said together, running over to the big man. The woodsman seemed dizzy, even as he tried to wave the others off of him, They still knelt, insisting that they take a look at his wounds.

Anna shivered. The influence of the madman’s five wisps still seemed to linger. She clutched the bracelet on her left wrist, hoping for some calm and clarity. It came, and now she was grateful she hadn’t revealed her own wisp companion to anyone in the village. She shuddered to imagine how they might react now.

She could feel the influence of the blue wisp in her bracelet growing. As she’d thought of the other wisps, his calm had turned to urgency again. The need to act seemed to flow directly from the opal in the bracelet into her veins. It took all of her concentration for several seconds to convince the wisp that now wasn’t the time for him to come out, to throw his influence over everyone. She tried to show him an image of all the villagers turning on her if he appeared. He calmed down. Still, he pulsed out that feeling from the tunnel. The one she could only describe as “get help.”

“How?” she asked, thinking of the other wisps. The urgency returned, though he wasn’t as eager to come out of the bracelet this time. She tried to send that feeling of confusion to the wisp. If he understood, he didn’t respond. He continued to insist she help.

“We’re going to have to send runners to Belmont,” Andrew said. “Lord Ironhill needs to know what his nephew has done.”

“He could have killed us!” shouted one of the other villagers. Several others offered similar cries of protest, calling for harsher punishments of the rogue knight.

“He’s going to attack another village!” one of the villagers said. “We need to stop him now!”

“He’s too dangerous,” Jonas said. “Something about him isn’t human anymore. I feel like a dragon stepped on me.”

“We should at least organize a watch to make sure he doesn’t come back this evening,” Bart said. He held a cloth to his forehead where one of the splinters had cut him, but he seemed otherwise alright. “We can send people to Belmont in the morning.”

“Good idea,” Andrew said. “Peter, we’ll take the first watch and make sure he’s on his way out of the village.”

“Right,” said the younger boy.

“Is there anything I can do?” Anna found herself asking. The villagers didn’t respond, still talking over one another. She opened her mouth to ask again, realizing they hadn’t heard, then she felt a hand on her shoulder and looked to see Donna.

“You’re a guest, Miss Anna,” Donna said. “We can’t trouble you with this.

Anna didn’t say anything. What could she do, anyway?

The door of the tavern slammed back open. Anna turned, expecting to see the knight returning. Instead, a tiny figure stood in the doorframe, her hair tied back in twin tails. “He grabbed Maddie!” Maggie cried, running over to Andrew. “He grabbed her and ran!”

For a moment, time stopped. No one moved accept the little girl, crying into her brother’s arms. Anna wasn’t sure her heart hadn’t stopped as well. “Where?” Peter’s word broke the spell, and everyone began to move. Andrew picked up the little girl, and the brothers dashed out of the tavern, followed by everyone else.

“Where!” Peter repeated as they got outside.

The girl pointed south, following the road that led to the rolling prairie in the center of the valley. Peter nodded. Then he sprinted for the mountain north of the village. Anna blinked, looking to the other villagers. They all ignored Peter, as if running away was the most normal thing in the world. It felt like it might be, of course. She thought she’d like nothing better than to sink into the ground, to try and find the Dwarven tunnels that crisscrossed the valley depths.

“…safe at home,” Andrew was saying, handing his crying sister over to one of the other villagers. Anna realized she’d missed the last several seconds of activity. Several of the villagers had scattered to the homes and farmsteads nearby. Only a small group was still here, and now a pair was leaving, taking Maggie off to one of the other houses.

“We can’t go after him like this,” Jonas said, taking Andrew’s arm.

The young man wrenched himself free. “She’s gone!” he yelled. “I have to go! Who knows what’s happening to her, just being close to those things? Who knows what he’ll do?”

“He’ll kill you if you go,” Jonas said.

“I’m going!” Andrew roared back.

Help. Help. Help. Help. Help.

The blue wisp’s urgency sprang up in Anna, and she stumbled. “Andrew, wait!” she said.

“I’m going after her!” Andrew said, not turning around.

Anna paused. An idea was forming in her mind, though she wasn’t sure how much of it came from her hidden companion. She found herself running after Andrew. “Andrew, I think I can help.”

“It’s dangerous,” Andrew, said, not looking at her. “Go back.”

Anna moved to block his way. He looked down at her, and she realized she’d never seen anger or fear before. Not like this. Not like those blazing green eyes.

“Andrew, I have something. Something that helps me keep my head around the wisps,” Anna said. “If I go with you, it might give you a better chance. It might help Maddie.”

Andrew waivered a moment. Then he nodded. “Lets go, then.”