Fallen Magician (The Magician Rebellion)
Read Fallen Magician (The Magician Rebellion) Online
Authors: Curtis Cornett
Tags: #magic, #epic fantasy, #sword and sorcery, #mage
- Title Page
- Prologue
- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Chapter 4
- Chapter 5
- Chapter 6
- Chapter 7
- Chapter 8
- Chapter 9
- Chapter 10
- Chapter 11
- Chapter 12
- Chapter 13
- Chapter 14
- Chapter 15
- Chapter 16
- Chapter 17
- Chapter 18
- Chapter 19
- Chapter 20
- Chapter 21
- Chapter 22
- Chapter 23
- Chapter 24
- Chapter 25
- Chapter 26
- Chapter 27
- Epilogue
The Magician Rebellion:
Volume Two
By
Curtis Cornett
Fallen Magician
The Magician Rebellion: Volume 2
Copyright: Curtis Cornett
Published: 27th October 2012
Publisher: Curtis Cornett
Copyright © 2012 by Curtis Cornett
Cover design by Curtis Cornett
Book design by Curtis Cornett
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Curtis Cornett
Printed in the United States of America
A Special Thanks
I wanted to take a moment to thank all of the fans of Rogue Magician, who helped to make the first book successful. As a first time author with no fan base and no marketing beyond a twitter account, it was word of mouth that helped the book to do as well as it has and to everyone who told someone else about Rogue Magician, I truly appreciate it and deeply thank you.
Spoiler: The prologue recaps many (but definitely not all) of the events from
Rogue Magician
to catch up new readers and refresh fans of the first book.
Dearest Mother,
I am not sure how to begin this letter knowing what I must tell you, but unsure of how to say it or even where to begin. Maybe I should start four years ago when we lived in Colum. Looking back everything seemed so much simpler then. I was seventeen years old and about to set out on my own as a journeyman courier. Along with Father, we lived an uncomplicated life as a happy family.
That all changed when we found the priest, Sane, standing outside our back window in a trance. He asked me to make a delivery for him and gave me his grimoire, a magical spellbook used for recording complicated magical spells and as a conduit for spell casting. I took the book where he told me and was attacked by an enraged ogre for my efforts, but with the help of Kellen, Colum’s knight-captain and most revered warrior, was able to defeat the beast… rather, I should say that
he
defeated it with my help.
It was during that battle that my talent with magic became revealed not only to myself, but to Sane as well; who was not truly a priest, but a powerful sorcerer in disguise. What may seem to some as a great realization of power and freedom in other parts of the world where magicians rule was anything but that in Aurelia. As a magician, I was now subject to the kingdom’s laws on magic and forced to live in a domain with others like me. I would have been unable to see you, Father, or anyone else I cared for again, but Sane offered me a way out. He made me his apprentice in part out of gratitude for my help with the ogre, but also because he blamed himself for awakening the magic in me that had been dormant for so long. In time my magic would have manifested on its own, so Sane’s offer was really a blessing although it did not seem that way at the time.
Left with no other choice, I accepted Sane’s offer and began helping him track down the magician who had set the ogre loose on Colum in the first place. Kellen, Father, a pair of Kenzai warriors, and of course, the elf ranger and your eventual teacher, Sari, joined us.
Our group traveled to the ogre’s cavern, but along the way we saw an amazing and frightful sight. A horde of ogres large enough to wreck the city was on its way to Colum. However, at the same time we spotted the magician responsible for rousing them off in the distance, riding towards Baj Prison. Unsure of which threat to deal with our group split in two. Kellen, Father, and myself rode ahead of the advancing ogres to warn the city guard. Sane, Sari, and the Kenzai warriors rode to face the magician.
We reached Colum not long before the ogres, but long enough to get the city guardsmen mobilized. Father and I meant to split up. I was to join you and ensure your safety while Father joined the city militia, but fate had other plans for us. The fighting with the ogres had already reached the city and we found ourselves pulled into the fight. For the second time that day, I was nearly killed by an ogre and after the skirmish Father took me to the temple of Ashura for healing, but the temple was overburdened with the injured and dying who were overflowing into the streets.
There was fighting all around the city and eventually one of the beasts attacked the temple grounds. There was no one there capable of defending the priests and the wounded and for the first time I was standing against an ogre alone. I was hurt and facing death when something deep inside of me came bursting forth- a magical spark that flashed into a raging fire inside of me. I threw balls of flame at the ogre one after another until the beast lied dead at my feet, but in my fury I did not realize the destruction I wrought on those around me. I have replayed that moment over and over countless times, wondering if I, or even Sane, could have done something differently to prevent that tragedy, but in the end it does not matter. The past cannot be changed no matter how much we may wish it were so.
I fainted from exhaustion and awoke in another place, a place of beauty. I hesitate writing this next part, because I know that it will sound crazy, but I swear it is the truth. I have never told anyone this, but when I next awoke I was in a place of serene beauty and before me stood our most revered goddess, Ashura- the goddess of life. Her beauty was beyond compare and I was drawn to her to a like moth is drawn to a flame, but she was much less taken with me fore she sought to end my life with her twin sister and the goddess of death, Kassani’s, help.
It is not well known among the common people, but there is an essence found within the very life-blood of every living creature in the world. Magicians can access this essence and use it to power their spells when they do not have a magical device like a staff or grimoire to channel their own internal power. I unknowingly killed nine people at the temple that night by draining the blood source of magic from their body. Among them was Father. I am sorry that I could never tell you this in person. My fear that you would hate me held my tongue these last few weeks since we were reunited.
The spirits of those I killed stood before me to pass judgment. In my grief and guilt, I offered to go with them willingly, but it was Father that argued my defense and convinced the other spirits to spare me. He was successful, but I did not pass their judgment unscathed. Ashura cursed me and swore Kassani to take my soul if I ever took another life even that of an animal or monster. At the time, it seemed a fitting punishment, but in the years since then it has been a difficult rule to live by.
When next I awoke I was back in our world. My body had been moved to the magician prison, Baj, and I learned that I was to stay there for the next nine years at which time I would be allowed to serve the kingdom alongside Sane. For his part, Sane spoke to the king on my behalf and was allowed to train me in the prison so that I would be a capable magician when I was released. For much of my time in prison, I hated Sane and blamed him for all of my troubles, but as the long hours passed in my cell I began to realize that my mistakes were my own even if he was the one who started me on my path and for his part Sane was trying to set things right between us.
Sane was a knowledgeable and kind mentor during that time, but he was not my only ally in Baj. My cellmates, or clustermates might be a better term considering the layout of the prison cells, who included the only grandmaster magician I have ever met and possibly the only one living today, Xander Necros, also taught me the ways of magic including more advanced techniques that helped me improve quickly during my sessions with Sane.
A year passed when I happened upon a way to escape the prison. I stole one of Sane’s traveling runes and using manipulation magic, taught to me by another prisoner, transported halfway across the kingdom ending up in Ilipse, a domain for magicians where they could live without magic. Ilipse was a nice place compared to Baj, but it was still a prison and knowing that it would not take long for Sane to find me; I had to escape. Above all else, Sane was the king’s man and it would be his duty to track me down regardless of his personal feelings. Through trickery rather than magic I was able to get free of Ilipse mere hours before Sane and Kellen arrived in search of me.
From there I traveled to a hidden magician refuge where I lived in relative safety and learned how to better master my powers for the next three years. During that time, I became close friends with the others who lived there and they became like a second family to me. I wish I could tell you more about them. They are very important people to me, but if someone else were to read this letter, then my friends would be placed in unnecessary danger. We lived in constant wariness of being discovered, but it was as peaceful a life as I could have hoped for as a rogue magician.