Chapter 2 - Pact under the light.
Vasu finished his speech and sat down in his high backed chair. Along with most of those in the hall, Haplo clapped. Briefly. In truth, a yawn had been struggling to escape out of his mouth for the last few minutes. The speech, for all that it had been relevant enough in content, had been monotonous at the beginning and downright tedious by the end. Vasu was a good mage, a better man and a genuinely great leader, but as the last few months had shown a good orator he was not. For all that Patryn preferred curt commands over flowery dialogue, it was odd that the people of Abri had picked one so ungifted as their headman.
Of course, the Abrians were a quaint lot, so maybe that was all there was to it.
As the clapping died down, Baltazar rose and advanced towards the front of the dais. In the last four cycles spent in the Nexus, the former necromancer hadn't lost one bit of his uncanny ability to intimidate through pure force of presence. Silence spread as his gaze swept through the crowd.
"Vasu's words have been wise and good. I shall do nothing to correct them. I will only reassert here and now the ideas that have lead us all to this moment, the proclamation of this covenant, this pact that has made two ancient enemies join their destinies until the day in which no light shall shine upon the worlds and the Endtime comes.
"What has gathered us today has been the wish (or rather the urgent need) to create a home for both Sartan and Patryn.
"There are some among us that feel neither the wish, nor the need. I will once again ask these individuals to keep a key fact in mind: we are trapped in the Labyrinth, for all time. We need each other if we are to survive this magic hell we made in our arrogance," he said looking straight at the closed ranks of a group of Chelestran Sartan arranged around Ramu, making some among them mutter angrily.
"A home, I say. We Sartan destroyed an universe to create another one more suited to our tastes, where we would be able to play the game of gods. And with THAT we only caused pain, suffering and left ourselves teetering at the edge of the abyss. You Patryns had the same kind of ambition and we took all from you. We put you in a world where our hidden anger and secret hatred resulted in suffering greater than our own.
"If there is a lesson our descendants must learn from this day is that we are no gods. We never were and we probably never will be. Yes, we have power that seem worthy of divinity. Might to destroy worlds, to create stars, to bring health or illness, to free or enslave... But not even our combined power is absolute. If it were... Well, everything would be much simpler and we would not be in our current situation. In the end, even we live in a world made for us, rather than one of our design. There are powers greater than our own. We must understand this, learn of our limits and hope that by acknowledging our limitations today, we may one day grow enough to leave them behind. Because it is quite clear by now that we aren't everything that we can become.
"A good friend, well known to many of you, has created a sentence that fits well here. In closing the gate of our prison, we have opened many windows. We claimed to be gods and only with the closure of Death's Gate has this burden been lifted from our shoulders, a burden much too heavy for the souls of false, flawed gods like we are.
"And it isn't just us that are free now. Who knows what we will find if we ever find a way to return to the Sundered Realms? Humans, dwarves, elves... they will stand or fall on their own merits, now. Who knows? Maybe if we ever meet them again, we'll find that those "lesser" beings, those mensch as we have called them for aeons, have become our peers. Perhaps something even greater, beyond our imagination and understanding. They no longer have to deal with false deities holding their hand. Their path is genuinely theirs finally. And ours is ours.
"The transformative effects of time that we sought to lock with a glorious, unchanging present are unstoppable now. Now, there will be a tomorrow. It might be better, it might be worse. But it will certainly be different and to a great extent it is up to us to decide.
"To finish, a wise man of the Ancient World, dead long before the Great Disaster, said once that it is fortunate that no one can ever cross twice the same river. We tried to freeze it with our runes, but the river has kept advancing with the slow, steady speed of a glacier. It is time to accept change and let the river resume its flow. The current will sweep us away and we don't know where the waters will take us. But if we try to remain where we are, frozen by thirty generations of hatred, the glacier will crush us and when we are gone it will thaw. It is time for change. It is the hour of lasting peace."
Considerably more enthusiastic clapping and even some ovations went with the Sartan leader as he returned to his seat, but some booing as well, from the group that Baltazar had reprimanded so bluntly. Alfred turned his face in the direction of the Chelestrans, then looked down with a sigh. A tear rolled down his cheek.
Haplo was about to say some words to try to improve his mood, when silence filled the hall. All eyes converged in the great bronze gates, which had started opening silently to let through two individuals. One was a woman dressed in black, white haired, yet young in face and figure. The other entered looking like a young human monk, but by the time it was near the dais it had taken the shape of a lady of the elven courts, richly dressed and inhumanly beautiful. There was little in common between both, except for the tangible aura of power they exuded and the glow of their eyes, golden for the woman in black and red for the shifting thing.
They were the High One, leader among the golden dragons, and the Royal One, undisputed ruler of the dragon snakes. They were the closest thing in existence to incarnations of good and evil, and each carried a polished orb the size of a human head, white marble and black crystal respectively. With the silence that their presence had caused still unbroken, they climbed the dais without hesitation. Vasu and Baltazar welcomed them with silent bows, which the High One returned. The dragon-snake merely sneered.
"We have been summoned to be witness to a pact of covenant," said the golden dragon leader.
"It is the agreed time," agreed the Royal One, before smiling a wicked grin. "First, however, we must hear the terms if the pact is to be valid."
The High One grimaced, but accepted the point with a nod and turned to address the gathered mortals.
"We come as representatives of our kinds, to witness a covenant and see ancient foes swear brotherhood. These stones we carry will soon join as one and be fused by our combined power, so that a visible symbol of this covenant will remain as long as there is life of any kind in this universe, even if both your peoples are consumed by the evil unleashed that governs this world."
"But this will be so only as long as you remain true to the pact," interrupted the Royal One with obvious delight in his voice. "Should the covenant be betrayed, the orb will crumble into dust and nothing will ever be able to repair it. Afterwards, any agreement, any alliance, any pact will fail and eventually the last of you will be able to reflect on your foolishness as he slides down my gullet."
"Abstain from childish taunts, creature. This is a sacred time."
For a moment, the Royal One regarded his counterpart with hatred and a clash appeared imminent, but the creature calmed itself down with visible effort.
"Let this foolishness begin, then."
Following a ritual that Zifnab had previously described in great detail, both released the orbs they carried at the same time. The stones floated towards each other and, upon making contact, fused into a single grey sphere that remained still in midair, halfway between the Pryan dragon and the Chelestran dragon-snake. Vasu and Baltazar approached at the same time and, according to the instructions received, touched the grey orb in opposing sides. Grey broke, replaced by swirling lights and absolute darkness, as the magic of both leaders and it the shared history of Patryn and Sartan reacted with the power of the stone to determine under which symbol the new covenant would be born.
In the end, the orb became white.
The Royal One growled, his eyes started glowing more intensely and the shadows darkened in the entire Hall, but before anything could be done the Stone of the Covenant released one single wave of white light that broke the shadows and launched the dragon-snake leader out of the dais. The dragon woman regarded him calmly as the dragon-snake rose in a rage, apparently eager to try again.
"That was unwise. They are not yours. This is no place for you, now. Go. We will meet again in battle soon enough."
"So we will, cousin. So we will. But I will see you destroyed for this. I will see them destroyed. And I will see that stone broken."
"You would see all things destroyed, consumed by chaos. That is your nature and can do nothing to escape it. Begone from this place, you craven coward!"
And with the command of the dragon leader, there was another wave of light and the Royal One disappeared with a scream of rage.
The departure of the Royal One removed the aura of dread caused by the creature's presence and some, who had collapsed when the thing had flared its fury and power, tried to savage their dignity by rising and discretely wiping away their tears, while the High One with the help of some assistants carried Baltazar and Vasu away from the glowing orb, both visibly dazed by the experience.
Apparently untroubled by the state of the magicians, the dragon in female shape turned to address the crowd.
"It is done. Sartan and Patryn from all the worlds are from now on a single people. The gap is closed, the wound healed. Never before has there been a covenant holier than this and it is unlikely that there will ever be. Remember this light in the dark days to come and rejoice. Let it be your beacon, your goal, a destiny that you can earn yourselves with your every action. Many among you may doubt this, but today is a day of joy and celebration, peace and love. A day for everything that makes my kind strong. Find your strength in love, rather than hatred towards your enemies and you'll overcome the Labyrinth itself."
Haplo, still somewhat out of it by the strange confrontation, found himself clapping. Shortly, the entire Hall thundered with the sound of applause, even the recalcitrant Chelestran Sartan, but the speaker demanded silence and continued talking.
"There are those who deserve this far more than I. Today is also a day for one who has long labored to unify the divided branches of his people. One who has succeeded in a hard task and earned his rest. Will you come now, friend and master?"
Sartan and Patryn turned towards the still open gates. Two more figures had appeared there and one of them, who resembled a beaten up beggar, answered with a chipper tone.
"Of course, Aunt Em. But I have to say goodbye to the Scarecrow and the Tin Man. And the Good Witch of the North, and the Winged Monkeys, and some others. Come with me, Toto!"
With a sigh born more of tradition than true exasperation, the other figure (taller, better dressed) nodded and entered the Hall. Zifnab and 'his' dragon started talking towards Alfred, Haplo and Marit.