“What was that?” he asked.
“Their commander came up here and swore theloyalty of the entire squad to me,” I said.
“Then I guess they are yours now. It reallyis a wise move. You need a crew on that ship in case we find abattle waiting for us,” he responded.
“Zalith, are you happy with this?” I asked. Icould not figure out what he was thinking, but he was obviouslygreatly torn over something.
“Vydor, not only am I happy about it, I amproud of them for following through on an ancient promise. I almostwish I could join them,” he said. “All Zalionians hold dearly tothat prophecy.”
I thought about it for a minute, then said,“Zalith, I need you on the Dragon Claw as my officialrepresentative and to take care of the Zalionians who are stillpart of the fleet. The Empire needs our help, and I need you tospearhead it in the Navy.”
He smiled and said, “It will be a great honorto serve you in that way, thank you.”
The captain looked at me and said, “You areturning out to be a great leader, Vydor. I am proud of you.”
“Thank you, Captain, but we have morebusiness to attend to. I have just learned that we will be jumpinginto a hot battle zone. The sorcerers are amassing their forces andplan to strike now before we have time to raise up an army ofwizards to face them. Are there any fleets nearby that you can callon for help?” I asked.
“The Phantom’s fleet could probably make itin about twelve hours. They are the closest,” he said.
“We do not have the time to wait for them.Let them meet us at the battle. If they arrive after the fightstarts, that could work to our advantage,” I said.
“I agree. If the sorcerers are stillgathering power then we dare not let them have any more time thanwe have to. I will also shorten our jump a little so that we havesome extra time to recover from the jump before rushing in,” hesaid.
“Captain, you must understand that everythingis at stake here. Call in all who can make it. If the battle dragson long enough for them to reach us we will definitely need them,”I said.
“I will have to delay our jump, probably byan hour, so that we can prepare the fleet for this. Do not worry,Vydor, we will win, no matter what they bring against us. I havenever lost a battle or war yet, and I do not plan to startnow.”
With that I wrapped up the conversation andcalled all the wizards to meet me in the Crystal Room. Once insidewe each took our official positions, and I said, “There is muchto discuss. You heard some of it when I spoke to the captain, butthere is more you must know. First, let me give you my memory ofthe meeting with Mantis.”
I looked around at each of them as theyreviewed it. Long gone was the ragged-looking group that I hadfound last year. They no longer bore the effects of the stress ofconstantly hiding and fighting underground for months at a time.They all looked strong and vibrant now. The power each of themradiated was immense. Soon they had absorbed the memory and werewaiting for me to talk.
“I have learned much since then. You heardsome of it during my chat with the captain, so let me go back andfill in the details. I will start with the identity of the darkspecter that we just defeated; he was the embodiment of a cursecast on my family line by the very first grandmaster sorcerer inthe hope of preventing my birth. His power came from my anger andfear, and his destruction was brought about by your love andsupport.”
“So then, he is gone for good?” pipedup Kellyn.
“Yes, Kellyn, we won.” I responded.That brought great joy to the room. It was our first great victoryas wizards, and there was nothing like complete and total victoryto cheer a team. Once the room was settled again I continued,“There is a lot more to cover, starting with what I was shownabout the future. When we come out of the next jump the largestarmy of darkness ever created will meet us. It will be made upalmost entirely of spirits, demons and other creatures from thedarkest and foulest abyss. This massive fleet will be outnumberedalmost three to one.”
I just let that settle in for a minute. Noone said anything while they visualized what that might look like.Then I continued with the bad news. “I foresee a death tollamongst the forces of light greater than that of any previous warin the entire realm. I cannot see who will live and who will die.You may or may not want to believe in the prophecy that Zalith toldus about, but the key is that our enemy does believe it, and theybelieve I am the one to fulfill it. Their plan is to wipe us outbefore we can reach full power.”
“Vydor, do we have the power to face themyet?” asked Andreya.
“The army of darkness we can handle. Thelower-ranked sorcerers, regardless of their numbers, we can handle.But any one of the Seven is more than a match for us,” Isaid.
“Then how can we fight them?” askedLuke.
“Well, we have two major advantages in thiswar that offer us a chance, if we exploit them to their fullest.The first is the battlefield itself. This is interstellar space;this is where the Imperial Navy is at its most powerful, and it isa completely alien terrain to the sorcerers. As far as I can tell,they have only fought wars on planetary surfaces before. What wewill see when we come out of the jump is a large army surrounding alone space station. All the sorcerers will be on that station.”
“Destroy the summoner, and you remove thesummoned,” commented Darnath.
“Exactly. The key to this fight will bethat station. And you can be sure they know that. I fully expectthe Seven to be on that station,” I said.
“But how do we beat them?” askedGafar. “If they are greater than us, then that station is safe,and we lose.”
“No, they are not greater than us, but anyone of them can defeat any one of us. You see, our second advantageis our ability to combine our powers. To do that you need atremendous level of trust and loyalty,” I said.
“Something sorcerers are not knownfor,” said Kellyn.
“Yes, and when we combine our powers theresult is far greater than the sum of the parts. No single one ofthem can match our combined power, just as the dark specter couldnot.”
“What of the weapon?” asked Gafar.
“I have found the weapon, and the funnything is, I have known where it was all along,” I said.
“You are the weapon they were lookingfor,” stated Kellyn.
“Not just me, but all of us. They weretrying to destroy me and prevent the creation of this Councilbefore we discovered our powers. They foresaw our coming and theyknew they could not match two Councils of Wizards, so they aremoving pre-emptively to secure a victory,” I said.
I looked around the room, meeting each oftheir eyes and said, “This fight we are about to face seemsdaunting now, but each of you must remember that we are their worstfear. They are assembling all this power because they know theirtime is short, and that we come in great power to fight them. Theyare far more afraid of us than we are of them.”
“Vydor, did that other spirit tell you allthis?” asked Kellyn.
“Some of it, and some I finally figuredout. I also know who he is now; he is the same man from the historythat Mantis told us, the one who raised up the twelve wizards tofight the sorcerers the first time,” I said.
“What else do we know about him?”asked Luke.
“Nothing, but that book back in my room isconnected to him. I do not know how yet. Later, when we have peaceagain, I will take the time to read it, but now our main task is toprepare for this war. I plan to summon Mantis and see if they canspare any wizards to help us here.”
“Brilliant! Since they are amassing herein great numbers, they must be pulling forces from Mantis’ realm touse here,” said Kellyn.
“That is the hope,” I said. I thenturned to the ball and summoned Mantis, for the first time using myfull authority as grandmaster to command his appearance instead ofmerely requesting a chat.
He answered the call fairly quickly andappeared in a purple puff of smoke. When he saw me, he stopped andbowed and said, “Greetings, Grandmaster Vydor, what can I do foryou?”
