Soulguard (12 page)

Chapter 26

              The turnout for the Exhibition was a great success. There were fifty Elites stationed at the Academy and every one showed up. There were also twenty trainees and twenty five Guards in the process of transfer. All of which were there.

              There were also twenty-five Mages present, five of which were Senior Mages. All of the trainees were present, even Gavin Price. Many of the Mages I had not even met yet.

              I was familiar with a few, though. Nora Kestril, Gregor Kherkov, Allen Denton, Regina Worthington. The Archmage wasn’t present, he was on some sort of overseas trip, visiting the other central bases.

              As every person entered the Dome, Paige handed out the booklet with our shield designs and fireballers. Some of the Mages looked at them and surprise rolled through many auras.

              “We’re going to have to start paying you instructors pay, too,” Gregor said behind me with a chuckle, “I thought you were trying to keep your skills a secret.”

              “Just parts of it,” I answered, “What can be used by all, I’m perfectly willing to share.”

              “Well I guess it’s time to start this circus and guess who gets to be the ringmaster?”

              “Heh, at least you don’t have to be one of the exhibits.”

              Gregor stepped out into the Dome in front of everyone, “Ok folks, we have an interesting evening planned for you. Before we start the Martial display, I welcome a new Mage who has brought some really great innovations to the Academy this year. Colin Jaegher.”

              I walked out to the center. I was a little nervous, to be honest, “Hi everyone, we just wanted to show you some of the things we’ve come up with so far. Paige has given each of you a booklet that has illustrations for all the things I’ll demonstrate today and then some. Feel free later to approach either of us for help if you so desire.”

              Everyone was quiet as they looked at the drawings. I saw many emotions rolling across auras, surprise, shock, and gratitude were present on a lot of them.

              “I want to start with the basic privacy shield and the personal defense shield.” I concentrated and lit up my privacy shield and portal switch. “The portal is how I control the amount of power flowing through the shield. You may be more comfortable with some other type of control. I like the portal.”

              I opened the portal wide and my shield hardened. I pushed the bottom down into the earth to anchor it and nodded to Kharl. He approached with five more elite Guards.

              “Most of you know Kharl Jaegher, he is going to demonstrate how powerful one of the Stream shields really is.”

              With that all five Guards opened up and pounded on my shield and I didn’t move an inch. They pounded for a few minutes then stepped back and Gregor stepped forward.

              Before anyone knew what was happening, he Pulled and threw a fireball at me. There were gasps and a few yells. It really feels weird to look down the barrel, so to speak, of a fireball. The fireball slammed into my shield. I felt the jar but my shield held nicely.

              “It’s strong and it’s versatile,” I said, “But it’s only as strong as your stream allows it to be. Mine is stronger than the average Guard will be able to raise, but any shield beats what the Guard had up until now.”

              “Mages should be able to make them as strong as this. The beauty of the thing is that you don’t have to focus on the shield after it’s crafted to keep it active. The portal lets you shut it down to a trickle that makes a great privacy shield without having to project one.”

              The Guards and most of the Mages applauded loudly and I saw Paige’s aura glow with pride. I looked to Kharl and his was much the same.

              I shut the shield down to the trickle charge, still visible.

              “Next I’d like to show you Mages a Protective shield with much the same qualities,” I opened the first shield portal to a trickle and lit it up, “I have several shields crafted that are much like the privacy screen, on a trickle charge you can feel it but it doesn’t stop anything. Push it out to where you want the shield and open the portal.”

              I opened the portal after pushing the shield out to about twenty feet from me. “My stream is large enough to feed three of these at once if need be.”

              I opened the second one and slammed it against the first, then I opened the third and did the same with it.

              “If I’m totally focused on defense, I can run the triple shield. Or if I need both defense and offense,” I dropped the inner shields and left the outer one up, “These shields are strong but they do weaken, the larger the area covered. It depends on stream size, more than anything else.”

              The crowd applauded once again. Some of the Mages were paying very close attention, now.

              “All that we’ve come up with is in the illustrations, and I know some of you Mages have special skills you’ve developed over the years. I would love to see some of these so we can add them to the guides. If anyone has even seen something that looks like it would be useful to a Mage, please tell me or Paige about it. We are trying to put together this book so all Mages can benefit from the skills that are discovered.”

              I shut down my shields and opened another portal, “Now this is a fireballer directly fed from my stream as well, all it takes is to open the portal...”

              Everything went great until I came to the fireball grenade. As I described how to make it, Gregor walked back out to the center where I was.

              “To have an idea how much power is in one of these fireball grenades he is speaking about, let’s just take a look at some video footage that Miss Turner has made available to us.”

              “Oh crap,” I muttered as a large screen lit up with a video of the Dome where I was experimenting. There were gasps as the grenade blew up just as it left my hand. It really does look like something out of a cartoon. I flipped at least five times as I flew across the Dome.

              When I got up and went back over scratching my head, looking confused, the whole crowd roared in laughter and applause.

              “It didn’t deter the young man, though,” Gregor said through his laughter, “He was back in the Dome and trying again before the day was through.”

Chapter 27

              “Our next participant will show us something that hasn’t been seen in this place for nearly twenty years. Kyra Nightwing will perform The Dance of Blades.” The lights dimmed except around the center of the Dome.

              Kyra walked out to the center and turned to the crowd of Guards and Mages. She wore a black body suit and her twin swords gleamed with silver.

              She opened with the first stance of the Dance like she would when we do this together but the focus wasn’t on speed. Her body flowed into the moves with a fluidity that made it so much more.

              As she spun through several of the moves, Paige, who stood beside me sighed, “She’s so beautiful.”

              I hadn’t realized how beautiful Kyra really is. Combined with the grace and poise of the Dance, I could see why everyone was sitting in silence with amazement flowing through their auras. The people who had actually seen her perform this had satisfaction and some had other emotions I won’t talk about. She is my mother.

              She began to speed up, twirling her blades into a fighting stance she uses on me quite often. Faster and faster she danced. I could see the deadliness of every move, but the beauty of the Dance masked the lethality and made this a completely new experience for me.

              The Dance ended with the same move I’d finished a while back only she didn’t throw an arc of power at anyone.

              The applause lasted a long time and I was clapping right with them. There were several wolf whistles and Kyra bowed to the audience and made her way to the exit.

              “That was awesome,” Paige said in my ear, “It doesn’t look the same when you do it. Yours is scary as hell.”

              “It was beautiful,” I chuckled and put my arm around her shoulders, “You ever see Kyra fight Demons you may rethink how you see that Dance.”

              “Now let’s welcome Bravo Squad of the Elites,” Gregor’s voice boomed. I wasn’t sure what all had been planned beyond my part and Kyra’s dance.

              Twenty Elite Soulguards entered the central area and lined up in a straight line. With a single sound, forty swords were unsheathed from the scabbards on their backs. All the Guards wore black uniforms like I hadn’t seen up to this point and each sword gleamed silver.

              With another single sound all forty swords sprang to life with Soulfire. Then began the most intricate performance I have ever seen. Each sword wove the exact same pattern around the guards. Every one in synch with the others.

              Another shout, and the Guards began weaving in and out around each other, swords blurring with speed. Not a single Guard stepped out of the pattern. I was amazed and just stood there with my mouth hanging open.

              Another shout sent every Guard up into the air, swords still weaving the pattern in synch. They landed in a diamond formation, the front twenty facing forward and the back twenty facing back. The swords never slowed. This continued for a second and with another shout each Guard performed a perfect spin kick to land exactly in the same formation.

              It didn’t stop there, the second they touched down every one of them launched another and another. I couldn’t see a single one miss a beat as they stayed in synch. The focus alone was amazing I don’t know how long it took to perfect this maneuver, but it was awesome.

              Another shout sent them airborne, once more to land in a perfect circle, their swords weaving the pattern and the spin kicks began again, just as before.

              This continued for a moment until with a final shout, they sprang into the air to land in the perfect line as they had started, with swords outstretched to the sides. Each sword tip was bare inches from the next Guard’s sword tip.

              The whole line bowed to the awestruck spectators and, as they straightened forty swords were sheathed in unison.

              Never in my life had I seen something so awesome. The audience seemed to agree because everyone who was seated stood and the applause continued for quite some time.

              “Wow,” came a voice from behind me. I turned to find Trent approaching along with Mattie, “That was better than I thought it was gonna be.”

              “Kyra was awesome,” Mattie said, “I want to learn that dance, it was beautiful.”

              “He can do it,” Paige motioned toward me, “But it’s not as pretty. His version tends to blow things up.”

              “Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

              “It was only the one time,” I protested. All three laughed.

We were interrupted by Gregor, “Our next presentation is from Gary Kahn.”

A very large man I’d met training with Tien entered the circle with the biggest battle axe I have ever seen. It was at least five feet long and the huge double blades were four feet across. It must have weighed a couple of hundred pounds. But Soulguards are strong and Kahn wielded it like it weighed nothing. He began an intricate performance with the axe, spinning it around him like someone usually would a sword. It was slower but impressive, nonetheless.

“I got to get me one of those,” Trent said in awe.

“It figures,” Mattie replied.

“It’s better than those little toys you carry around,” He said.

“She’d cut you twenty times before you could swing that thing,” I laughed.

“But it looks so cool.”

“I’d worry more about getting your new shield figured out, you big ox,” Mattie said, then turned to me, “He’s having a hard time with the shield because he hasn’t finished focus training yet.”

“It’ll come a lot easier after you get the hang of the focusing techniques.” Paige said, “We usually keep a new Mage training for a year before they begin anything else. Colin’s the first that jumped right past that into regular training. Of course, he cheats.”

“It’s not cheating,” I protested, “I got skills.”

“Yeah, keep telling yourself that if it lets you sleep better at night,” she said.

Gary Kahn finished his performance to another round of applause and Gregor strode back into the circle, “Ok, our next demonstration needs a Mage to volunteer.”

“Ah, Colin seems to have stepped forward to volunteer.”

I looked to my right and left, everyone had stepped back a step, leaving me where I was. With a long drawn out sigh, I returned to the circle where Greg waited with a huge smile. I heard the laughter of Guards and Mages alike.

“Over here will be fine,” Gregor motioned to one side of the circle and a Guard ran out to give me two of the practice short swords. His aura rolled with anticipation and that was a good sign I wasn’t going to enjoy what was coming.

“The opposing side of this demonstration is twenty-five veteran Guards.” Gregor’s voice boomed and I knew I wasn’t going to enjoy it. “Anyone receiving a ‘killing blow’ drop where you are and let us see what we will see.”

A killing blow is a blow to the midsection that would “kill” someone in a real battle.

“If you receive a crippling blow, the appendage is rendered useless.”

At that point, the twenty-five Guards filed in. They lined up in an arc along the other side of the ring. I saw the Guard who had talked to us in the Mess hall on the left flank and the woman who had asked me to check out her shield, her name was Daphne Cavanaugh, on the right flank. I recognized many of them but there were some I hadn’t seen before as well.

I stretched to loosen up and prepare for this. I knew this demonstration wasn’t just for me, but for the Mages, in general to keep in mind. A lot would be for me though, to remind me that no matter how good you are, you can be beaten.

Just knowing I would lose didn’t bother me but it isn’t in me to lose without a fight. They’d know I’d been there.

“Ready?”

I nodded when Gregor looked at me and the guards nodded when he looked at them.

“3…2…” The world slowed to a crawl, “1…Go!”

They launched at me but I was already amongst them. It was a short fight, but I’d landed seven “killing blows” and ten “crippling blows” before the first one got through to me. The first person to hit me was the guy from the Mess hall and the second was Cavanaugh.

“Halt!”

Everyone stopped as Gregor entered the ring again, “The point to this demonstration is that, no matter how good you are, numbers can still overwhelm you. This goes for Guards and Mages alike. But let’s see what happens when there are two Guards aligned with the Mage and see what happens.”

He turned to me, “Pick any two of your opponents to join you.”

It was an easy choice, I picked the two who had hit me first. The man smiled and Cavanaugh chuckled. As they approached my side, the man said, “I didn’t get to introduce myself earlier, I’m Rictor Hughes.”

I nodded and Cavanaugh said, “Keep your eyes on the match and not my ass and we’ll do fine.”

My face turned red and she laughed, “What’s your plan?”

“It may not be what you guys really want to do, both of you are aggressive fighters. But if you’ll trust me we’ll win this.”

“What do you want?”

“I need one of you on each flank and using pure defense. If I don’t need to worry about my flank defense, we’ll go through them faster than you would believe. Just trust me to take care of offense.”

I could see the doubt in Rictor’s aura but I didn’t see any in Daphne’s. She’d seen me fight the Elites, she knew I wasn’t just bragging. I saw acceptance roll through his aura and I began to loosen up once more. Two more Guards joined the other side to bring the number back up to twenty-five again.

“Ok, we’ll be moving fast, we don’t stop for anything, right flank first and we’ll work our way to the left.”

They both nodded and we moved to our positions. The countdown began once more and the world slowed to a crawl again.

“Go!” rang out and we were moving to the right in a flash. The only way one of them could get to me was the flanks but Rictor and Daphne are a couple of the best Guards with swords I had ever seen. No one was getting through their defenses. Guards received “killing blows”, one after another until all of them were down. We hadn’t received a single hit.

“Halt!”

The crowd stood and applauded, while Gregor made his way back out to the center if the ring.

“Just two Guards made a great difference in that bout. This tells me that one person no matter how good can be beaten, but a person with support can do so much more.”

Everyone began putting the practice swords back on the rack until I started to put mine away.

“Hold up just a minute there Colin,” Gregor said and I felt another sense of dread. I swear they all love to do this to me. I thought it was just Kharl and Kyra, but everyone was enjoying this too much to just be them. I think all of the Guards must have a sadistic streak in them.

“The final demonstration will be a one on one match between Colin, here and a friend that came over from China, just for this exhibition. Let me introduce you to Len Yueh.”

A man walked out into the circle and smiled at me. His Soulstream was larger than mine and he carried two practice swords like he was a pro.

This was the other shoe I’d been waiting to fall. I knew there was something planned for me but I thought it was the bout with the Guards. Len Yueh approached me and placing one of his practice wands under his arm, he held his hand out to me. I did the same and shook his hand.

“Shall we give them a show?” he asked in perfect English.

I nodded and he smiled again, “You know the Dance?” he asked.

“Kyra taught it to me.”

“Good, she was always my best pupil. Let us Dance the Blades together,” he said.

This is the guy that taught Kyra? This is going to be interesting, I thought.

“Let us start slow and speed up as we go.”

“Ok”

We moved to the starting squares and loosened up. Once more the countdown began and the world slowed.

“Go!”

We met in the middle of the ring at a moderate pace and began the Dance. Every attack was parried, both his and mine. We moved with the fluidity Kyra had shown earlier.

“Faster,”

We sped up and continued, every time he sped up I matched him, our swords blurring with the speed at which we were moving.

“Now we give them a show,” he said softly, “Pull and let us see how fast we can go.”

I Pulled from the Source, my swords flared to life with Soulfire, as did his and the world slowed once again. We Danced the Blades, glowing with Soulfire and I’d never felt so good in all my life. Times like these are the only time that the rage that festers below the surface of my mind can be used. I use it and I become more than I was before.

But I can’t let it out completely, I’m not sure what would happen. So I use what I can and it feels good to be able to release it.

Around the ring we danced until we heard in an incredibly slow voice, “Halt!”

When we stopped and turned to the crowd, amazement and awe rolled through auras and everyone stood in applause. I saw Kyra at one side and there was pride rolling through her aura.