Chapter Two

Magus stood alone in a black, empty space. He tried, in vain, to examine his surroundings and determine where he was, but there was nothing but the vast, black shadow. A single light shined down on him, illuminating a small area around him. He knelt down to touch the ground and found it to be smooth and hard, like tile. There was no dirt or other filth and it seemed to be that way all around him. He stood erect again and looked up, into the light. It stung his eyes, but he was determined to find something, if there was anything to be found, that could tell him where he was.

A gentle whisper carried in the air, barely audible. His head snapped in the direction of the sound and his heart raced: He recognized the voice.

Without a thought, he ran. The light followed him and the whisper became a voice. Screams and sobs and bursts of power could be heard. He went further and could hear the tense screech of metal being strained to its limits and the sounds of bodies slamming against something hard and solid, then going limp. The screams grew louder, but they were no longer of the same voice as before. Men and women roared defiantly and shrieked at some unseen horror. With every moment that passed, another voice was silenced, and the whisper could be heard again.

She was crying. He could almost see the tears running down her cheeks through the blackness. The image of her holding her hands to her face, weeping, unable to escape the pain and terror and guilt stood solely in his mind. Then he heard laughter: a wicked, evil cackle. He knew that laugh too.

"I still cannot believe it has come to this." An old man's voice said. "Even as I watched it happen, I always thought she would come to her senses."

"She has been lost for some time, Melchior." Another old man, this one sounding much weaker and sickly, said. "We always knew this was the likely course."

"It doesn't bother you, Balthazar, that we are about to turn our backs on a lifetime of service to Zeal?" Melchior asked, his melancholy heavy on his voice.

"We do what we must in the name of Zeal." Balthazar answered. "We all know that what we are about to do will make no difference. Our home will be destroyed and everything we knew and loved with be gone. This is not about success or failure. It is about who we are."

"Alas, if we were younger men." Melchior said, a bit of his warrior's fire returning to his voice. "Dare I say, in our primes, we may have had a chance."

"Hey!" A third elderly voice said. "I do believe the path before us is open and there is no time like the present. Shall we proceed?"

The voices faded away and Magus was left alone with only the sounds of chaos to keep him company. He saw nothing, he felt nothing, but he could hear the sounds of a wild battle, with magical energies the rivaled his own being unleashed and just as it seemed that battle was reaching a climax, everything went silent. There was no sound for moments, and then there was that terrible scream. It had haunted him for decades. Not a night had gone by, for more than twenty years, that he did not hear that scream in his dreams.

"Janus! What are you doing here!" The gentle, woman's voice asked. Magus' eyes went wide as he heard those words-the last words he'd heard her speak.

He closed his eyes tightly and held them shut for what seemed like an eternity. When he opened them, it was all there: The three gurus on their knees in front of him, his mother wearing a sickening smile as she surveyed the carnage from the shoulder of her god. He saw Schala collapsed upon the floor, lacking the strength to stand, let alone resist the force before her. He saw Lavos in all his horrible glory. He could feel it's power seep into his very pores. I was just like he remembered.

He inspected himself and, as he expected, he was a boy again. His arms and legs were short and chubby, his cheeks fuller and the muscles beneath them didn't pull down in the perpetual scowl that had he'd grown so accustomed to. Instead of his armor and cape, he was wearing those regal, purple robes that they always made him wear. Everything was so much bigger and that unshakable confidence he'd acquired in the years mastering his craft was gone, replaced by the fear and confusion that so often inflicted the helpless. He wanted to do something, to change it all. His mind screamed at him to cast a spell, but he knew that the boy wouldn't even raise his hands.

The monster shrieked again and those holes, those black portals, opened up beneath the gurus, one by one, just as he remembered, and when they were gone, he looked down, just in time to see one open up beneath him, eager to swallow him whole and take him away from everything he knew.

Magus awoke back in the cave, drenched in sweat. Though there had been a time when such a dream would have bothered him, he'd long grown used to the nightmares. They'd plagued him all his life and that one in particular had plagued him, off and on, ever since the day he'd lived it for real. His conscious mind had been dulled to the terror and he reacted to them now on instinct alone. He took a deep breath and swallowed, and felt for the amulet around his neck. As he stroked the jewel, he looked around and saw the girl laying across the cave on the other side of the fire pit, which had burned out as they slept. He wiped the sweat from his face and closed his eyes.

The magic of the amulet brought his conscious mind back into the dream and from there he watched it all unfold again and absorbed everything he could from it and kept his eyes open for anything new, something different from his memories and all the other dreams. It didn't happen often anymore, but he knew that it could, and if it did, he needed to take advantage of it.

Sure enough, just as as he began to fall into the darkness, he saw something different; something that unnerved him greatly. He watched as Schala turned her gaze away from him. He followed her eyes and saw, in silhouette, a familiar figure. It ran toward him as he fell and just as the hole began to close, her face came clearly into view:

Lucca.

He let go of the amulet and returned to the cave significantly bothered by what he'd seen. What it all meant was beyond him at this point, but he knew that whatever it meant, the success or failure of his coming endeavors were tied, in some way, to his unlikely companion.

She stirred a bit, catching his attention. Her body shivered violently and her lips and fingers had turned blue. She'd curled up into a ball, laying upon the floor as a baby rests within its mother's womb. He scowled at the sight, annoyed by the thought that, without his help, she might die of frost before they ever began to make their way to Algetty.

He pondered the question of whether or not to just leave her there to die. He didn't like what he'd seen in his dream and was tempted to simply leave the problem behind. His dreams were always complicated and unraveling their mystery was always a great source of trouble with just as many disappointments as there were rewards. He was often tempted to give up the practice he'd learned as child, but was always reminded of the tremendous gains it had brought him.

The difficult part, of course, was trying to determine what it meant. Her presence was the only difference from the horrors he remembered as a child, which immediately told him that her presence jeopardized his plans. He was also firmly aware that he'd seen too little of the event to know if something happened before or after that would change the outcome. He sighed in frustration at the impossible prospect of making an informed decision based solely on what he'd seen. The slightest error would doom everything and he did not like the prospect of risking everything on the flip of a coin.

As she stirred again, he considered approaching the situation from a different perspective. She had been his enemy, engaged in mortal combat with him and was a factor in his failure to complete the summoning ritual, delaying his vengeance. On the other hand, she'd saved him from the cold and nursed him back to health using medicine that she had to know she might need for herself. Everything she'd said and done since the end of their battle indicated a willingness, perhaps even a desire, to work together, even if begrudgingly so toward a common goal - Lavos.

He knew she wasn't telling him everything, but everything that had happened so far told him that her quest against Lavos was genuine, which in the warlock's mind was no small thing. The thought that he no longer stood alone against the godly monster he hated so much comforted him. For so long, he'd operated on his own, hiding his intentions from those closest to him, those who would use him and Lavos to sate their blood thirst. He was able to work with what he was given, and used them as much as they tried to use him, but the girl freezing at his feet now represented something different, something bigger. He didn't have to use her. He could work with her and, perhaps, even trust her.

The thought jarred him from his contemplations. Trust was not something he was comfortable with and even the thought of it frightened him. He could tell her things, exchange information with her without fear of it turning on him. There was no obstacle on the path to Lavos that he was not certain he could overcome. What concerned him was when they reached their destination and the blood began to spill, would he be able to count on her? Could he rely on her? Could he trust her with his life.

Not now, he acknowledged, shaking his head at the thought. There was too much at risk to even consider it, but the potential was there. Seeds of trust had been sown, the question was whether or not his soul was fertile enough to allow them to grow, but he would give it time.

He took off his cape and place it over her. Then he held his hand to he back and chanted softly. The cape grew warmer as the whispers passed his lips and her watched her body relax, releasing the tension that had coiled her up. Her shivering stopped and some of the color returned to her skin.

He knew it wasn't a lasting measure, but he was fairly certain it wouldn't have to be. He left the cave to search for food and firewood, all while he wrapped his mind around the recent developments and plot to come.