Chapter 13

13.
         There was barely any hesitation in Tristian's motion, just a slight bulge and shifting of muscles and then he was moving. Michelle, who could see the patches and fragments and rivers of magic that moved around everything living, had never seen anyone move that fast unaided. He brushed past her, barely seeming to part the air, his legs getting ready to make the leap right at Johan. Even from her position at the door she saw he wasn't going to make it, or if he did, he'd just wind up going out the window with Johan.
         She had to do something fast. Summoning the power that she could spend a lifetime studying and not even begin to understand, she felt herself open up and flow. As Johan slipped another inch, something grabbed him by the back and yanked him firmly rearward just as Tristian wrapped his arms around him and added his momentum to the fray. The combined efforts sent them both tumbling backwards onto the floor.
         Michelle rushed forward to make sure everyone was okay. She let go of the power as she did so, feeling the momentary regret when she did so. The feeling of magic slipping through her always seemed to make the world fall into much sharper focus, like adding another extra sense. But there was folly in keeping hold for too long. Unless you were made of magic, you couldn't make yourself a conduit for too long. It ate you up inside if you did. She had seen it and didn't long to become like that. Ever.
         "Tristian . . . ah! what are you . . . doing!" Johan was shouting, attempting to disentangle himself from the other man. Michelle watched the two of them, wondering whether she should bother to step in and help. Nah, they seemed to be doing quite well on their own. Now that the danger was passed, it seemed almost amusing. She wondered why Johan was leaning out the window like that, or why Tristian had gotten so worried about that. The king hadn't told her much about these two men she was assigned to, other then they had traveled with the Magents. The implied hint from the king was to figure out if the Magent had some angle that he was working at, some card he wasn't playing above the table.
         "What were you doing, leaning out the window like that?" Tristian asked, almost slithering out from under Johan. Michelle marveled at out smoothly he moved, completely natural and effortless. And yet underneath he seemed a swarming meld of contradictory emotions, never sure if he was doing the right thing.
         Johan sat up now, staring up at the standing Tristian. For the first time she noticed he wasn't wearing a shirt. His skin was pale but there was little fat there. He wasn't someone who had worked hard in the fields but he was no stranger to work. But his face was sad, while Tristian tried to hide his feelings on the inside, Johan wore them outside on his body. Perhaps he no longer cared enough to hide them. Michelle could have found out, there were spells for peeking into minds, but she didn't see any need. She was only here to observe and aid, if the king wished more information, let him ask them himself.
         Seeming to speak slowly and delibrately, Johan replied, "I was cleaning my shirt when a gust of wind blew it out the window." He shrugged. "I guess I didn't want to be embarressed and ask for a new one, so I went to catch it before it fell completely." Johan looked quizzically at Tristian. "What did you think I was doing? Jumping out? Why would I do that?"
         Tristian seemed at a loss for words. "I . . . because you know . . . because since . . ." finally giving up and shaking his head. "Nevermind, there was no harm done." Obviously attempting to change the subject, he gestured for Michelle to come in. "Johan, this is Michelle, the mage that the king assigned to help us orient ourselves. We were just coming around to get you to see if you wanted to be shown around the place."
         "Pleased to meet you," Johan said, as he stood up, offering his hand to Michelle. The hand that touched her was trembling ever so slightly and in his eyes there was a sense of loss. Something had happned to him recently, something that had changed him. You didn't need to see magic to know that. Somewhat nervously he ran a hand through his hair, the path ending at the back of his head, "Ah, I'd go along with you but I'd rather go running around like some farmer with his shirt off . . . and I'm afraid I don't have any others. We were, ah, not given much time to pack." A brief smile, there. He was trying to be warm and friendly but it was so hard, she could tell. A loss, definitely. And the wound still raw and lingering, not to be ignored.
         "We can make another one for you," Michelle answered him, "if you just go down to the tailor's and tell them what it looked like, they can probably recreate it."
         "A magic shirt?" Tristian asked from the other end of the room.
         "Not quite," Michelle told him. "It's still cloth, we just make the process go faster."
         "Where is it?" Tristian asked suddenly. "I'll go find it and bring it back."
         "No, Tristian I lost the shirt-"
         "And you'll still be walking around the castle half clothed," Tristian cut him off. "I might as well go and I could use a self guided tour anyway." He turned to Michelle, saying, "Though if you would give me directions . . ."
         She did and he went, though not without a bit of hesitation she noticed. Tristian was definitely intruiging, she thought, and he seemed to have taken a fancy to her, even slightly. She wasn't sure what she thought about that. His connection to the Magents made him appealing but was it more than just scholarly. She had no idea and wondered if she'd get the time to find out. Still, the conversation from before interested her, especially at that brief glimpse of the spirits that drove him. The desire to help people, even at the cost of himself. Even at the cost of everything. Where his best constantly wasn't good enough.
         But Johan was here now and she might as well talk to him. The man needed to put at ease anyway. Might help to get him talking, get his mind off whatever was bothering him.
         "How long have you know Tristian and the Magents?" she asked him, figuring that was a good way to start.
         He sighed and sat on the edge of his bed, his hands on his knees. "Not long, I'm afraid, but long enough. Maybe too long." That last part was whispered, probably not even for her to hear. He looked up at her. "They saved me on the road, when I was ambushed and their presence probably saved my village."
         He was holding back, she could tell that. Michelle didn't want to pry or probe, but curiousity still stirred her nonetheless. "But they couldn't save something else, could they?" she said, wondering at the same time what was making her say that. Had she studied magic for so long that she had forgotten how to relate to people? She had talked to Tristian readily enough and yet here . . . here she wanted to know everything, regardless of the cost.
         Johan looked at her sharply and appeared to be readying a stinging comment when he simply just sighed and looked down at his legs. "The Magents and Tristian have done a world of good for me," he replied dully, not looking at her. "I'd be dead if it wasn't for them."
         "Don't you want to return to your village though, go back home? All of this really doesn't involve you, does it?" Still prying, maybe because magic couldn't reveal the inner feelings of a person, couldn't spell out what drove them. She could squint and a world of color opened itself up to her, colors that she didn't have words for. Vibrant and alive, all of them. And yet when she looked at these men, those colors didn't exist. Tristian was a magic void, he didn't resonate with any color at all, only the red echoes of being close to the Magents and that wasn't much of a color at all, merely the memory of one. The repeated tolling of a bell that had cracked long ago. But Tristian didn't seem bothered by that, his inability to even connect with the magic that flowed around him wasn't a problem as far as he was concerned. He was alone from himself and even from the world. It shunned him even as he tried to shun it. Always a one way street. Always seeking.
         Johan was a flame slowly being put out though. She stared at him, trying not to be obvious and she had to look hard for him. His color was fading out, dulling even as they spoke. He was losing his will to live, to connect, to even want to be with people. Michelle could see that but for all that insight, she didn't know what to do about it. It was watching a drowning man from the shore, when you couldn't swim out to save him. You stood there and watched on the odd change, the strange hope that something would come along and save him and you would be there to see it, but it never did and you just stood there. Stood there and watched. Colors are flowing around. Stare at those instead.
         "It's something . . . to do . . . I guess," Johan answered her slowly. "Something to pass the time . . ." he shrugged, "you could call it my duty, if you want. We're all in the service of the king, are we not? What we do here, it could affect everyone. It could save everyone. How can I not want to join in?" But even at his most fevered pitch, Johan's voice never rose above a monotone. Never became anything more than just a voice, just something speaking.
         "It was terrible," Michelle said suddenly, her voice high. She had been staring too long at Johan and the muted colors that flowed around him suddenly parted and a glimpse of something that she didn't want to see raged out at her. Blinking, she let her vision blur back to normal, shaking a little. She had seen raw naked emotion come rumbling from the depths of Johan, and the sight of it had unnerved her completely. Standing, she moved closer to the door, swaying slightly.
         "What?" Johan asked, just as suddenly, hearing the tone in her voice suddenly shift from clinically caring to worrisome fright. "What are you talking about?" even though he knew, "Are you all right? What's wrong?"
         "Johan, it's eating you up inside, don't you see it?" she said to him, her eyes seeming to be blind. She was so glad she couldn't read minds, or else she might not be able to block the emotions probably pouring from him like a gushing waterfall. Pushing some hair out of her hair, she stared at him again, in normal vision. "You're letting it tear you apart, because you don't even want to care anymore. Don't you see?" To her ears her own voice sounded foreign and frantic. Shrill.
         "It's not," he said to her, enlightening signalling in his eyes. It was clear that he didn't know how she knew but the discussion had finally touched a nerve. "I'm fine, you understand," and he probably never realized he was shouting, "You see, there's nothing wrong, everything is fine!"
         "Oh, Johan," Michelle said softly. "Who did they take from you?"
         He blinked and flinched as if struck. Almost physically so, since he spun from her and turned to the window, placing his hands on the rock sill and leaning heavily against it.
         "It's over now," he whispered, leaning down. "Leave me alone, I just want everyone to leave me alone."
         Michelle stayed over in her corner of the room, not sure what to say or do. She had approached this as a sort of game, trying to find out something about him, somehow forgetting in the process that he was a person, that what had happened to him was truly terrible and had scarred him. Seeing magic didn't mean you could see people. She wouldn't forget about that for a while.
         At that moment there was a rustling in the hallway and Tristian reentered the room, saying a bit sheepishly, "This is going to sound silly but I really couldn't find the-" and then he stopped, casting his gaze around the room, a question forming on his face. Michelle just looked at him, unable to say anything.
         Johan acted first. "I know where it is, I saw it on the way to my room," he said abruptly, striding across the room, pushing almost angerily past Tristian and stalking off down the hallway.
         "What happened?" Tristian asked after a minute.
         "I . . ." Michelle began, trying to regain her composure, feeling something wet forming in her eye, "I tried to reach him, I wanted to know what had happened to him . . . it was . . . too soon." She stared up at Tristian. "How does he live with it? What happened to him?"
         Tristian looked at her, and then looked around and sighed. "You didn't know I guess," he said, shaking his head and sighing again. Then, only hesitating slightly, he told her. "When Johan's village was attacked, his wife was killed."
         "Oh no . . ." she said, figuring that it had to be something like that but hearing it confirmed made everything different. And to think that she had tried to tear that out of him.
         "She was pregnant with their first child," Tristian continued, not looking at Michelle at all. His expression was impossible to read and Michelle had the crazy impulse to just stare at him, seeing past the red residues, trying to see tbe kind of magic that a man like him would create. To live your life without experiencing any of it, to be totally alone. It was impossible to figure. To even conceive. Even Johan had his own pitiful diminishing kind.
         But Tristian was still talking, hushed, halting. "One of the Magents, the other one, the one not here, he was protecting Mari, Johan's wife, when the village was attacked. He was shielding the house, but he was taken, taken away by something that I think we're going to be fighting. Without his protection, they got in and . . . killed her." Saying it brought across nothing of the emotion of the events that had transpired then. And yet his voice was impossible to ignore.
         "I didn't know, I . . . I have to talk to Johan, let him know that . . ." but Tristian stopped her by raising his hand.
         "Johan doesn't care anymore, that's his problem. I know, I've been where he is, not because of the same thing, and maybe not as bad but I know how he feels. Maybe I'm getting there myself, after all this time. Maybe that's what this is all about." His words weren't making any sense to her, he might as well have been talking to himself.
         "Is that why you help people?" Michelle asked, and suddenly it was like she could see into him forever. "So you don't stop caring? So you don't become like Johan?"
         He didn't answer her, but he didn't turn away either.
         And before matters could go any farther, there was a shout from down the hall, around the corner.
         "Tristian! Michelle! Get over here!" It was Johan.
         And again Tristian was in motion, even before Johan had stopped shouting. He was running at impossibly fast speeds, well within the limits of the speed of a man but still almost a blur. The power of the Magents. It rubbed on him and made him like them. Or was he? Michelle didn't know, but she took off after him anyway, not used to running, especially with her robes. She lagged behind but didn't want to teleport. It always took a lot out of her.
         When she got there, it was already over. Johan was standing there with his new shirt in his hand, and Tristian was leaning over something. A body. She could see blood pooling on the floor, the copper stench, not red like magic though. Red like death. It was laid out on the floor, a guard, in armor.
         "I was coming back and . . . I saw this thing standing over the guard, this black thing with glowing eyes and it just stared at me and it . . . it was evil, I could feel it . . . and then . . . it just vanished." His voice was numb. "He was dead by the time I reached him. I went to grab for my sword but it . . . it wasn't there. Would it have done any good?" The man was almost babbling in fright. Tristian on the other hand was completely calm. Michelle felt herself falling into a neat center between the two of them.
         "It wouldn't have done much . . ." Tristian told Johan and his voice sounded old. "In fact you probably would have gotten killed." He stood up now and Michelle could see the body on the floor. She remembered the guard, having passed him many times in the hallway, always exchanging pleasantries. She never knew his name. Never would know his name. It was easy to see how he had died though, there was a gaping, sucking hole in his chest, blood seeping from that. It had gone right through his armor. It was perfectly circular. There were no other marks on his body. But with a wound like that, there was no need for any others.
         Tristian's hand was straying near his belt for some reason, but she couldn't understand why.
         But in a voice that almost rumbled, he said to her, "Michelle, get us to the throne room. Now."
         She was already gathering the energy to do that, feeling herself opening to the world, all her perceptions colored in blue. "Tristian, what's going on?"
         "Just do it!" he nearly snarled at her and then they were gone, the world becoming blue everything, the sky turning upside down and imploding.          
         The world resolved itself again and drained itself of blue. They were in the throne room again. In the throne room and staggering, she was. They were staring at her, everyone in the room. The king and queen were there, as usual and the Magent was standing before them. He seemed to be saying something. But weren't they supposed to be in the king's rooms. How had Tristian known where the Magent was? Or had he just guessed? Her head was spinning from the teleportion and she knew half her questions would slide out of her head once she stopped being dizzy. But she wanted to grab them and keep them there because she felt they were important.
         "Agent!" Tristian yelled, or that's what it sounded like but the name was so foreign to her confused ears. The Magent turned to stare at Tristian with thin annoyance. "Something is happening, I know who's behind everything! We have to hurry to stop them!"
         "We have plenty of time," the Magent said, his voice utterly calm. "At least fifteen seconds or so. Then things will start making more sense. Which will be a definite relief, if you ask me."
         There was a piercing, gurgling scream from the other side of the room, cut off right at the climax.
         "Ah," the Magent smirked, and Michelle found that look absolutely frightening as it was bland, "right on time. Don't you love it when everything runs according to schedule? Hm?"