Mark of the Fool
Chapter 571: What is Here and There

Alex couldn’t quite figure out what was happening.

Moments ago, he’d been in a deep trance, searching for the Traveller’s power. He’d managed to touch it a few times—even gripped and changed its shape—but he still couldn’t do anything practical with it.

He’d held it and manipulated its shape in different ways, desperate to learn how to use it properly. If he could at least partially master it by the time the Games of Roal started, his team would have a major advantage.

Unfortunately, wishing for something and making it a reality, were two entirely different things.

Some things had been going in his favour though, making him a bit more hopeful.

As the weeks had passed, the power had increased within his soul, becoming easier for him to grasp. And as it grew, it also became easier to shape. In the last few days, something had changed with it: when he tried to use it, he’d started feeling…something in the air around him.

At first it was subtle, becoming more noticeable the more he experimented. As he moulded the power to his will, he also felt a growing awareness of the space around him, almost like his sense of touch was expanding incrementally.

The feeling of being on the cusp of reaching a new level hung near, dangling just out of sight…but to get there, he needed something, maybe an extra push to touch it.

As usual, the Mark had kept interfering while he focused on casting another summoning spell to take a look at how the power bolstered his spells, when suddenly, he was pulled from his trance by a dull thud.

He looked up to where Theresa, Grimloch, and Hart were practising in time to see Grimloch drop Hart with a single blow from behind, planting the Champion face first in the dirt. The Hero had fallen like a dead tree.

After calling congratulations to the victors, he noticed Theresa’s distracted mood. She asked him if he’d noticed anything odd.

But he’d been so busy searching intently for the Traveller's power, he’d been nearly dead to the world around him until Grimloch’s fist had met Hart’s head.

After that, his mind had gone to the Games of Roal…and what he planned to ask Theresa. The time would soon be there, though he felt nowhere near ready.

He must have been staring at her for too long, because she’d suddenly started staring back at him and said, “Are you okay?”

Since his thoughts had run away—as they often did—to the future and his plans for her engagement gift, he looked suspicious.

He’d also inadvertently let his eyes drift over to Brutus who was asleep by a nearby hill, which also drew even more scrutiny from the woman who knew him best. He cursed himself.

‘Don’t give anything away!’ his mind screamed.

“Yeah, I’m fine…just stuff on my mind,” he’d said quickly.

“Like what?”

“You know, stuff,” Alex said, looking at her earnestly.

“I think I’m about to make a breakthrough,” he said quickly, trying desperately to change the subject.

“Really?” She looked at him sharply, “How close?”

“Very close. I think I just need to figure out one final thing, and I’ll have it. I was just about to try something when I saw your fight end.”

“Sorry, then,” she said, looking down at her swords. “I’ll let you get back to it.”

Again, she gave her blades a puzzled look, worrying him.

“Are you sure something didn’t happen?” Alex asked.

“It’s okay…for now,” she said, giving him a look that said, ‘we’ll talk later’.

With that she turned and went back to Grimloch and Hart so they could debrief about their battle. Alex watched her for a while before turning away.

They would indeed talk later, as she’d said.

He looked up at the sky, thinking about birds that once spied on all of Greymoor without the expedition knowing they were being watched.

‘Better safe than sorry,’ he thought, preparing to start his summoning spell again.

As his mouth opened to begin the incantation, Thundar’s words broke his concentration.

“Not bad, Drestra, not bad at all,” the minotaur was saying.

On a hill nearby, he was pacing back and forth in front of what appeared to be five Drestras standing in a row, all acting casual. He was examining them as a general would examine his officers, or a baker his pies.

“Hmmmmm,” he mused, scanning each ‘Drestra’, before reaching out. He leaned in, carefully looking at each of five faces before tapping the fourth Drestra from the right on the shoulder. “Here you are,” he said. “This is the real you.”

With a loud groan, Drestra spoke a single word of power, dismissing her illusionary duplicates, they faded away. “How did you know? I was sure they were perfect.”

“Honestly, they nearly were,” Thundar congratulated her, taking his hand away from her shoulder. “The thing is, you probably would have fooled almost any first year wizard, and you definitely would have fooled like a single monster. Just…one tiny problem.”

He tapped his brow. “The ‘eyes don’t lie’.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Well, it’s not a big deal. Probably just means you need to be more careful with your visualisation when you’re chanting the spell. Remember what I said? Illusion is all about the image you have in your head. The less detailed you imagine your image, the more easily someone can see through it?”

“Okay, but what do you mean about the eyes? What was it about my eyes that gave me away?” her voice crackled with annoyance.

“Well, your image was real solid, but the light from the sun was dull in your copies’ eyes.” He pointed to the clouds above. “You probably didn’t think you needed to take care of that detail because it’s a cloudy day, but here’s the thing: the sunlight was dull in your illusions’ eyes, but it shone real bright in the eyes of the real you. Always remember that.”

He paused, not noticing how silent his surroundings had become. “Come to think of it, your eyes are really unique. Almost like jewels or pools of gold: they’d sure as hell catch the moonlight too, so you gotta pay attention to that at night. Got it?”

Thundar looked down at Drestra, who was staring up at the minotaur. Her body language had gone completely stiff, and Alex could see the beginnings of a blush creeping up and over her veil.

She quickly looked away. “Is that so,” her voice crackled, this time with something entirely different from annoyance. “I…I’ll be sure to remember that. I’m…going to practise what you said over there, behind that hill for a while.”

“You sure?” Thundar asked.

“Yes!” her voice sounded high. “I’d like to figure out these illusions before I show you them again.”

“I dunno, maybe I could give you some critique while you’re doin’ it.”

“Just…let me do this,” she nearly pleaded.

“Well, well, aren’t we eager!” Thundar laughed. “Fine, then, take all the time you need! I’ll wait here while you perfect your images! I’ll be watching you closely!”

Drestra made a strangling sound, then quickly cast flight magic and flew behind the hill. Likely—in Alex’s estimation—to have a small meltdown.

He’d first noticed the Sage of Uldar’s growing crush on his large friend after she’d revealed her true form in Tenebrama. It had only become more obvious as the months passed.

Of course, Thundar hadn’t noticed.

At all.

Or maybe he had.

As Grimloch, Theresa, Hart, Alex and even Claygon stared at him, the minotaur scratched the fur on his skull, looking in Drestra’s direction.

A frown etched his face, and bewilderment his body language.

Had he finally noticed? Was he finally going to say something?

The minotaur opened his mouth, coming closer to his friends.

“Huh, you guys think I was too hard on her?” he asked in quiet tones. “She might’ve been pissed off at the end there.”

Theresa’s jaw dropped.

Alex stared at the minotaur as though he suddenly had more heads than Brutus.

Hart looked up at Alex. “Your friend’s an idiot.”

“I know, right?” both Alex and Theresa said as one.

“What?” Thundar spread his arms. “What? What’d I say?”

Grimloch shrugged. “I didn’t see you do anything wrong.”

“I didn’t…see anything…either…” Claygon said.

“Of course you two wouldn’t!” Alex cried.

Grimloch shrugged, turning back to Hart and Theresa. “Wanna go again?”

“Sure, I could do with a little revenge,” the Champion said, raising his sword.

“Yeah, I’m ready too,” Theresa agreed, lifting the twinblade.

As the warriors squared off again, Thundar sidled up beside Alex. “Listen, you gotta tell me what you guys are talking about. I mean, you don’t think she likes me, do you? I mean…she’s an all powerful archwitch in the making and—”

“Thundar,” Alex said seriously. “As good as you are at seeing through illusions, is as bad as you are at seeing yourse—”

“Hey Traveller,” Hart’s voice boomed. “Bless me with a crushing victory.”

“Suck up,” Grimloch accused.

Alex’s words died.

Again, the Traveller’s power flared in his soul. “Hold on for a second man, I’ve got to deal with something.” He said.

Falling into himself before the minotaur could reply, Alex reached into his soul before the energy’s flare could pass. He grasped it quickly, feeling Hannah’s energies coursing through him.

It was stronger than the last few times he’d caught it, and he wanted nothing more than to master it right there and then. But he slowed down, examining it, holding it, not wanting to let it go.

He began to think methodically: not wanting to distort its shape and send it fading away again. Alex considered what to do: ways to shape the power and get it to finally do what he wanted it to.

Again that spatial awareness sharpened and—for an instant—it was like he could feel every blade of grass around him. Was that a clue? What did it mean?

‘Think, adapt. Think, adapt,’ he thought to himself. ‘Eliminate what you’ve already tried. You reached out with the power like an arm…that didn’t work. All it did was make the energy slip away. Extending it out like a bridge didn’t work either. Another failure. Trying to make the energy…teleport out of my body failed. Think…what are you missing? I can feel it inside myself, and more spatial awareness around me. Do I have to spread it out like a field? Maybe it’s like a net, and I can teleport to anywhere within the net.’

He cast the idea aside. ‘No, Hannah teleported to other planets, how the hell would this power reach out and make a net wide enough to reach other worlds? No, that makes no sense. Alright, think about the summoning spells and Planar Doorway. You can feel her power reinforce the spells. And how? It’s a connection. It makes a connection: I can feel the power touch other planes. What kind of shape can do that? Connections…connections…what shape can reach across planes?’

Alex strained his mind, trying to link everything together. Distantly, he was aware of Theresa and Grimloch battling Hart as the twinblade clanged against the Champion’s titanic swor—

His thoughts froze.

The twinblade wasn't two weapons.

It was one weapon in two physical objects, but still connected.

‘Connection…’ he thought. ‘Connection.’

At last it hit him: all this time, he’d been fundamentally misunderstanding the power. He’d been thinking too much like a wizard, and how mana would form circuits, connections, and paths to complete a spell.

But this had nothing to do with mana or magic circuitry.

It wasn’t divinity.

It wasn’t alchemy.

It was pure magic.

And how did Hannah describe her power? Did she talk about shapes, connections and complex formulae? No, she simply talked about going from one place to another. She said nothing about reaching out to that place.

Even now, her power was fuelling both her phone and the energy inside him, and that was across a barrier that was—to all methods he had access to besides Hannah’s power—impenetrable.

Yet, whenever he imagined himself appearing in a new spot, nothing happened…because he’d been only thinking of half of the equation. The twinblade was the clue: one weapon in two separate forms.

One for each hand.

And when someone was travelling—even in teleportation—there were two points of space that were most important: the origin and the destination. He didn’t need a bridge, but he needed to focus on both where he was, and where he was going.

“Please work,” he whispered, falling into himself.

His grip tightened on the power, and—this time—he imagined himself appearing in another point in space, around ten feet in front of him. He focused on the power in his body and that power at his destination at the same time.

The instant he focused on both places…

…the energy blazed bright.

And he felt the world shift.

Several hills away, a spy from the church—wearing the shape of a common mole—watched the Heroes and young wizards practising in the distance.

Suddenly, the one floating in mid-air was gone.

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