Sci Fi & Fantasy / Chapter 6

It was the screams that woke him.

Gasping, Connor sat up rigid in bed. The images of his dream flash in front of his eyes a moment, then fade away. He raises a shaky hand to try and rub them away. Wiping the sweat from his forehead, he looks around the dark room trying to discern where he might be. Unable to make anything out in the dimness, he collapses back on the bed, letting out a long shaky breath. Hearing a noise in a room beyond his, Connor snaps his head over in the direction of where the sound came from and listens, straining to make something else out.

Unable to remember where he was, he silently creeps from the bed over to the doorway which he made out from a soft glowing light coming from beyond. Slowly peeking from the door, he sees a dark room next to his then another past that from which the light is emanating from. As quiet as he can, Connor slips into the next room and walks slowly towards the next door, keeping more to the interior of the room to stay out of the dim light.

Keeping his eyes locked on the doorway, Connor suddenly knocks a knee against something hard in front of him. Holding his breath to see if anyone heard the small noise, he waits. Hearing nothing, he slowly reaches down to rub his knee and feels the smooth surface of the object he bumped into. Running his hand along it he follows the object around and finds it is set against the wall.  

Putting his back against the wall as he reaches it, he inches along towards the doorway. Reaching the edge, he ever so slowly moves his head past the doorframe and peeks into the room.

A fire is slowly burning down in the hearth in the middle of the room. From the soft glow, Connor scans the room, looking for the source of the noise. Looking first to the far wall he sees another door and then shelving against the side wall. Following the shelves to the center of the room Connor sees the outline of a person sitting on a chair and pulls his head quickly back into the shade of the room.

After a few minutes of hardly breathing he gets up his nerve again and peeks out into the room, just putting his head out far enough for an eye to see the figure. He watches for a moment, unsure if the person is awake or not. After another few minutes and being fairly certain the person is sleeping, he sticks his head out to get a better view of the room and to start planning his escape.

Just then the figure on the chair speaks, startling him.

“Come in young one, it’s safe. No harm will come to you here.”

Getting over the initial scare of the voice, Connor relaxes a little, but keeps his guard up in case he has to bolt. Stepping into the room he stops just inside and leans against the doorframe, keeping his eyes mostly on the person but glancing around quickly just to make sure there were no other surprises he didn’t see before.    

As he watches the woman, knowing it from her voice, Connor sees her open her eyes and gaze at the dwindling fire. Then she speaks again without looking at him.

“I didn’t expect you to awaken so soon. Did you have trouble sleeping?”

Connor surprises himself with his loose tongue, thinking normally he wouldn’t be so eager to give information to someone unknown, but he senses something familiar about the woman.

“Yes. I had a nightmare. I seem to be having many as of late.” Connor shakes his head at this, wondering how he knew about his other bad dreams since he couldn’t seem to remember anything else before he woke.

“I don’t remember much of it.” Even as he spoke the dream which woke him seemed to fade from his memory.

The woman, still watching the fire, spoke again.

“From what I heard from you, it would be better that you forgot it entirely. You were crying out quite loudly before you woke up.”

Connor crosses his arms and studies the woman.

“Who are you?”

The old woman finally looks over at him, her face becoming more familiar with every passing second. Then the fog shrouding his memory was suddenly lifted.

“Shila!” Connor almost yells. He moves into the room and sits on the bench at the table.

“What am I doing here,” he asks the old woman who is once again watching the fire. She says nothing, only stares straight ahead.  

A little confused as to why she is being so silent Connor runs a hand through his hair, and tries to remember why he was there but cannot recall the reason. It feels as if the memory is being kept from him behind a wall and he can’t break through. Try as he might the memory eludes him, but he doesn’t give up. He can feel it there and knows it is important so he keeps trying to remember. After struggling with it for a time, he hears Shila let out a breath.

“Do you really want to know the reason?” she asks quietly.

“Of course.”

She says nothing but looks over at him and raising a hand, places a finger against his temple. The wall that was blocking everything until he woke up shattered and everything came rushing back to him like a torrent washing over his mind.

He gasped as the horrific night came screaming back to him. Visions fluttered by his eyes. Some slowed as he watched them then sped on past.

The whole night of running away from the soldiers until he reached Shila’s sped by like a blur, slowing again only when he was back at the inn with his father. Darkness enveloped the rest, if there was anymore. Connor felt the world start to spin around him, then as quickly as it hit him, the feelings were cut off. The memory remained, but the suffocating feelings of dread and sorrow and hate were greatly subdued.

Coming out of the memory, Connor’s eyes focused to where he actually was. His eyes met the old woman’s as she watched him. He still felt those feelings that were being held back by something but they had no where near the strength as before.

Connor rubbed his eyes, not wanting the terrible images to come back. He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up. Shila gives him a small smile and starts to speak in a low voice.

“I am sorry for blocking your memory but I wanted you to rest. We have to leave soon and have a long journey ahead of us. You will need your strength along the way.”
        
“What did you do just now?” Connor asks wondering how those intense feeling were so quickly diminished. Shila just shrugs her shoulders.

“Like I said, you need to get your rest. I blocked everything from your mind so you could sleep. After everything you went through I didn’t think you would be getting much rest so I did what I could.”

At this she raises a finger. “But be warned. After we leave this place, I will no longer do it unless I have to. I know it will be painful for you but it must be done if you are ever to move on and get the help you need. Now wait here a moment, I have something for you.”

With that Shila turns around and heads back through the door into her room. Connor bows his head again as he remembers the heart clenching feelings that hit him so hard again. As Shila said, they were greatly reduced but he could still feel them there, below the surface of whatever she had done. It might have been blocked but the pain was still there, renewed once again and Connor felt himself slipping back into the dark mood of that night.

He knew he wanted to cry but no tears came. He was sure he should be weeping at the moment and probably wouldn’t stop for a good long time. His heart had started pounding when the memories returned but hadn’t slowed much when the rest was blocked.

He could hear Shila rummaging around in her room, looking for whatever it was she said was for him. He vaguely wondered what it was then decided it didn’t really matter. Nothing mattered anymore. His mood sank deeper into the blackness of that night.

At last Shila reentered the room holding a chest in both her hands. Connor raises his head from the knot on the floor he had been staring at but didn’t see, an expressionless look on his face. Shila hobbles over to the table and put the chest down next to him. He looked dumbly at it. The chest looked to be nothing special. Just a normal brown color with three leather straps on it, one close to each end and one in the middle. It had metal studs on the straps but nothing else on the chest itself. Something was strange about it. The straps were there, but there were no buckles on them. There didn’t seem to be anyway to open the chest without cutting the straps off. Besides that, Connor saw no crack around it anywhere where it should open.

After inspecting the chest, Connor looks up at Shila unimpressed.

“You brought me a chest?”

She looks back with a scowl. “Of course not. It’s what’s inside that is for you.”

Putting a hand on the top of the chest, she closes her eyes and speaks something silently. Then pulling her hand back, the top of the chest opens, revealing a black cloth covering. Connor sits up a little to see inside, but doesn’t reach in to explore the contents.

Shila opens her eyes and moves around to the side of the chest. Gingerly, she reaches down and taking the cloth at the front of the chest, pulls it back and places the excess in the open lid. Connor lets out a small gasp as she does this and he sees what lies beneath.

Sitting inside are two gleaming silver gauntlets. The light the fire cast in the room was dim and getting dimmer as the fire slowly burned down but what small amount of light hit the gauntlets seemed to make them shimmer brightly. They were set facing the opposite direction of each other. The smaller part where a wrist would be covered lay next to the larger area of the forearm covering of the opposite piece.

Reaching down with both hands, Shila lifts one out of the chest and holds it in front of Connor. The gauntlet gleams more brightly, now being in more light. Unknowingly Connor reaches out and touches it, just placing a finger on the shiny metal. The shock of that touch causes him to yank his arm back as he lets out a small cry of part surprise, part pain. Any admirable thoughts he was having vanished as well.

Rubbing his arm, Connor scowls up at Shila.

“What’s wrong with that bloody thing?”

Looking a little confused, Shila lifts the gauntlet close to her face and inspects it. She didn’t know what had happened nor did she feel anything when Connor touched it. Looking it over a last time, she places the piece of armor back next to its twin and turns to Connor.

“What happened?”

Glaring at the chest, Connor gives his arm a little shake. “When I touched it, it hurt. It felt like my whole arm was on fire and at the same time freezing cold.”

Shila softly takes his arm in both her hands and pulls it out straight. “Tell me if anything I do hurts.” Connor nods and she starts softly squeezing parts of his arm, working her way up from his wrist to his shoulder. When she reaches his shoulder and he still hadn’t said anything, she let his arm go.

“You didn’t feel anything?” Connor shakes his head.

“No, it only hurt bad for a few seconds then the pain started fading. It’s pretty much gone now.” Connor moves his arm around a bit to test it, then moves his hand and fingers.

“It’s gone. “

“I suppose it would be. I didn’t feel any sign of lasting damage. Your arm’s fine.” Turning to the fire, her gaze lingers on the gauntlets a moment as her vision passes over them. After a few minutes of running things over in her mind, she speaks softly to herself.

“I guess its true then.”

“What’s true?”

Shila slowly turns around at the question and faces Connor. “You have magic.”

Connor frowns at hearing this. “No I don’t. Where did you get that idea?”

Shila lets out a small sigh at his reluctance to accept what she knew to be true.

“Besides what I told you about being a descendent of Gabriel’s, it hurt when you touched the gauntlet. The gauntlets themselves are made of magic. If you didn’t have any magic within you then nothing would have happened when you touched them.”

Connor’s frown turns back to a glare. “Are you still going on about that? And you mean you knew what would happen and you did nothing to stop it?”

A little taken aback at how angry he suddenly seemed, Shila almost backs away a step.

“Well, no. That was…...unexpected. I didn’t know that was going to happen or I would have warned you.”

Turning her attention back to the chest, she taps a finger on her chin. “I want you to touch it again.”
Moving his glare to the chest, Connor scoots back a little from where it sits on the table. “The bloody thing just burned and shocked me and you want me to touch it again? No thanks.” He crosses his arms as an act of finality, wanting Shila to know he had no intention of doing what she asked. Shila moves around the table and walks up, stopping in front of him. She places her hands on his shoulders and looks down at him. Connor raises his eyes to meet hers, his glare still sitting on his face.

“Please do this. It’s very important.” Connor’s glare falters at how soft and sincere her voice was.

“But why? It already hurt once. Why would I want to get stung like that again?” Her countenance looked as soft as her voice.

“The magic of the gauntlets might have only been responding to having two different types of magic touch it at the same time.” Connor rolls his eyes at hearing again how he had magic. He didn’t believe it, yet. “I just want you to try it again. I know it hurt the first time but I need to know if it was because of that or something else. It’s important.”

Hearing her say it was important for the second time piqued Connor’s interest. “Why is it so important?”

Sighing, Shila took her hands from his shoulders and sat down next to him. He turned to face her as she did.

“I don’t know if you believe you are Gabriel’s descendant or not yet, but I do. And I know how devastating having that kind of power is. Especially when you can’t control it and don’t know you are using it.

“The gauntlets were made long ago and are made of a very strong magic, a very specific type of magic. They were made for all the offspring of Gabriel, to help them with their struggle. The gauntlets block the magic of the Chraeon so you won’t unknowingly use it, like when you are asleep. If you wear them then you are safe from the power awakening in you. You won’t have to worry about killing anyone and not knowing it. That also means if you do eventually learn to control it, you won’t be able to summon it either while you wear them. That is why it is important.”

“So if a group of men come after me and try to kill me, they will block whatever abilities you think I have from awakening even then? They could kill me and it wouldn’t protect me?”

Shila nods.

Connor turns from her and, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, watches the fire for a time. She speaks again, knowing what he was thinking about. Her voice is even softer, almost a whisper.

“I know what it will mean to you if you put them on. It will mean you believe all I have told you. That the life your parents raised you with wasn’t really your own. It was just something to occupy you for a time, until something happened and they couldn’t keep the truth from you any longer.” She tenderly put a hand back on his shoulder. “I’m sorry it had to happen this way, that you had to find out in this way.”

Despite what she was doing to block his emotions, Connor’s shoulders sag and he drops his head, a tear running down his cheek. His voice comes in a bare whisper. “Please help me.”

Moving his shoulder, the shoulder where her hand still rested, he reaches back with his hand and blindly feels for the chest. Taking her hand from his shoulder, Shila moves down the bench and taking his hand in hers, places it against the front face of the chest, then removes her own. Connor feels up the front of the chest and reaching the top, he takes a small breath. Still not looking he reaches inside and puts his finger tips on the shiny metal.

Letting his breath slowly out, and looks over to Shila and gives her a small smile. “It doesn’t hurt.” Shila returns the smile and nods.

“As I thought, it was just reacting to two different kinds of magic. Now you have to put them on.”

Connor’s smile fades from his lips and he retracts his hand. Before it gets to far, Shila grabs his wrist. Looking to where she holds him, Connor tries pulling his arm away but she holds fast. He looks back to her, noticing her eyes have hardened some.

“I know this is difficult but it must be done. It is for my safety as well as any others we come into contact with. Once you learn to control it, you can be free of them, but not before. Besides, they won’t be that bad to wear. They were made well and I’m sure aren’t all that uncomfortable. They will look good on you. But most importantly you won’t kill anyone.”

Connor frowns a bit at hearing that last part. Shila then releases her grip on him and standing up, goes over and puts a log on the almost dead fire. Connor starts running things over in his mind, but stops before he gets to far. Knowing he can’t change the past, he will do what he must not to let it happen in the future. Letting out a small sigh he stands and walks over to stand in front of the box. Shila moves to the end of the table to watch him.

Staring down at the two, almost eerie shining gauntlets, he speaks quietly.

“Alright, I’ll do it.”

Reaching down he grabs the front gauntlet and holds it up. He somehow knows instinctively that it fits on his right forearm. Feeling something on the bottom area, the area that was face down in the chest, Connor turns it over to see what’s imprinted there. When he first saw them sitting in the chest, there was nothing on them, just a smooth piece of metal with small lips on each end. Now seeing the other side, he gazes at the images there. Dragon, EXPLN. (Same on other gaunt)

Looking them over again, Connor realizes that he can’t simply just slide his hand through it and asks aloud how it opens, as there is no seam or part that looks like it unlocks to open it. Almost as if on command at the question, he hears a small click and the gauntlet opens. He looks it over again, a little suspiciously this time, and sees that the inside is padded with a soft cloth material. He looks up at Shila questioningly. She just shrugs her shoulders.

“The wearers may have them on for a while so the makers must have taken that into consideration and added that for comfort.” Connor nods , in part a little for his agreement.

He places the gauntlet on his forearm so the dragon is on the top and the head is at the thinnest part of his wrist. Then reaching underneath he grasps the rest that is hanging from an unseen hinge and pulls it up and around the bottom of his forearm, stopping just before he connects it. Shutting his eyes he says a small silent prayer to the divine spirit and pushes the gauntlet closed with a soft click. Not feeling any different after it is closed, Connor opens his eyes and looks at his wrist. The armor piece still has its bright sheen, maybe a bit brighter with the fire growing and casting more light. Turning his arm over he looks at his newest accessory thinking it actually did look good on him. He grips the gauntlet in one hand and moves the other around a little, seeing how well it fit his forearm. The cloth inside did make it more comfortable then he thought it would and it also snugged the gauntlet nicely to him so that it did not move around much but was loose enough that air could flow freely between skin and cloth so it wouldn’t get uncomfortably sweaty in warm temperatures.    

Connor turns back to the chest and picks up the remaining gauntlet. He puts it on his left forearm, dragon facing towards his hand to match the first, and without hesitating clamps it shut. Shila has been watching him the whole time and as he closes the second gauntlet on his arm, he thinks he hears her let out a small breath. He thinks it’s a little strange that she was holding her breath but shrugs it off, instead turning to his new armored forearms. Crossing his arms one over the other, he knocks them together, testing their strength. As he does this, the gauntlets make a strange clinking sound, and a faint green glow appears around them each time they are struck together, then fades away. Seeing this, Connor frowns and strikes them together again. They clink again and again the green glow appears and fades. Shila clears her throat and Connor looks over at her.

“It’s for protection. As I said before, the gauntlets are made of magic and that is part of it. It’s to protect them as much as you. The sound you hear when you strike them together is the normal sound of metal on metal only it is warped by the magic, that is why it sounds different. As for the glow, that is more for your protection. If a blade or any other weapon strikes them, they will be deflected off and leave you and the gauntlets unharmed. No weapon is sharp enough or stout enough to be able to break them. The magic protects them from it.”

Connor looks back to his arms. “I guess that’s good. I don’t want my hands getting cut off.”

Shila lets out a small laugh. “No, that would not be good. But there are a few other things I must tell you about them. First of all, you won’t be able to remove them by yourself. Once we get to our destination and you learn about your abilities, then and only then they will be taken off. Like I said, it’s for your protection as well as mine, and any other people around. The second thing is that while you wear them, I will know your whereabouts, so if we ever get separated I will be able to find you again.”

“How does that work?” Connor asks absently while running his fingers over one of the dragons.

“I can sense the magic that they put off, kind of in the same way I sense your aura only I can sense the magic of the gauntlets from far away.”  

Connor drops an arm to rest on his leg while brushing the other hand through his hair as he lets out a sigh. “So you mean I’m trapped now, I’m a prisoner.”

Shila moves in front of him from her spot beside the table and puts her hands on his arms. She looks down at him and gives him a small smile but he keeps his eyes averted, her smile fades. “Try not to think of it in that way. We are trying to help you. I know a good deal about the people that came before you and I know this way is much better then the ways some of the others took. They were outcast everywhere they went, and in some parts the foolhardy families of those who died, even people that had died of different causes and had nothing to do with your previous family members, hunted them down. I can’t explain it but some died from that.”

Connor looks up about to ask a question, but Shila cuts him off before he can ask. “I don’t know why the Chraeon didn’t protect them. It might have something to do with so many generations passing and no one knowing how to control it, but I’m not sure. The point is this is the best way to do it. We are going to help you, you just have to trust us. Trust me.”

Reaching down, Shila takes him by his wrists, her fingers wrapped around the front edge of the gauntlets and gently pulls Connor to his feet. “Now lets get you back to bed. We have a long journey ahead of us and you will need to get your sleep while you still can.”

She starts leading Connor back to his room when he suddenly jerks his arm away from her grasp. Turning around to face and question him, she stops before she can ask when she sees the anger in his eyes.

“What do you think your doing?” Connor asks in a menacing voice. Shila slowly shakes her head.

“What do you mean. I want you to get some more rest. You’ve had a traumatic….”

“You were touching them again!” Connor says cutting her off. Shila’s eyes dart to his arms by his side, to the gauntlets on them.

“Did it hurt?”

“Not this time. But I didn’t want to wait for it to happen.”

Shila raises her eyes to meet Connor’s and takes a step towards him. She didn’t say anything or give him any kind of look, but to Connor she seemed to grow larger in that step, somehow. Maybe because the fire had suddenly taken to the wood and was casting a large shadow of her over the table and up the wall. He sees her brow drawn down and a flash of anger hit her face, but it is gone almost as soon as it came. She speaks, her voice anything but angry.

“I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I won’t touch them again. Just please go back to bed. You need to rest.” She holds out her hand back towards the bedrooms. Connor gives a small smile of embarrassment and glances to the floor as he passes her.

After she hears him lay down on the bed, Shila goes back to her chair and sits in it, her brow creased in thought. How could he have gotten through my shields so easily she wonders. He shouldn’t be feeling much of anything with what I put up. Maybe he found a crack. Maybe it’s the magic helping him. It has been traumatic for him lately, maybe that’s what it is. Oh well, no need to worry to much. He’s mine now.

The fire suddenly bursts even higher, climbing up the soot caked chimney, almost reaching the top as it crackles and sparks to her silent laugh.

On the bed, Connor put his hands behind his head and sighs. As he stares up at the barely distinguishable ceiling, he thinks about what Shila told him. How he could be what she said he was. He had never heard of the story of Gabriel and his magic before, and it was hard to believe he might be related to the man, very hard. He didn’t remember anything of his life before his parents that would cause him to believe Shila was telling the truth. He remembered much of his adolescence and a bit of his childhood before that but nothing of when he was very young that would point to what Shila believed as truth. She seemed so sure of it. Not a doubt seemed to cross her face when he denied it. But she did know of his nightmares, how awful they were, even though he couldn’t remember them, and how he never remembered them when he woke.

Raising a hand from the back of his head to scratch an itchy spot, he pauses to look again at the gauntlet on his arm. Then there were these things. It hurt a lot when he touched it when Shila was holding it. The pain was gone but he could still feel the jolt of when it happened. It felt like it seared his flesh and all the nerves, tendons and muscles in his arm, maybe even burning the bone. Connor moves his hand again in front of his face and even though he could still dimly see it in the light from the fire, he would swear it should been burned to a crisp.

Sighing again he returns his hand to behind his head. He had to admit, the gauntlets looked good, on him or not. The pain from them also went to prove what Shila said. They didn’t hurt when he was handling them himself. And they were quite comfortable, if a little heavy. They were for his protection as well, so she said. He would wear them for now, in case she was right and he was killing people in his sleep. Better to have to wear these things then kill. He didn’t want to kill. She said he killed those men, then the village…. . No, he would do anything to stop the chraeon, that uncontrollable power that ruined the lives of so many people. He would learn to control it then find a way to be rid of it. He wanted nothing to do with it. It already destroyed his life. Connor thought he should feel sadder then he did. He thought he should be weeping right then, thinking about the villagers he grew up with and around, but he didn’t. How strange.

As he thought about it, his mind darts here and there, finally traveling back to Gabriel. It was his fault he was like this. The man was dead almost one thousand years and people were still suffering from what he agreed to. How could he have done that? He knew he would pass the magic down to his children and they would pass it to their children, and it finally came to him, after all those years. Connor decided then and there never to have children. He didn’t think that would be such a difficult thing to achieve since any girl who found out what he was would want nothing to do with him.

Gabriel had ruined his life, and countless others. What a selfish man. And he did it to stop a king who wanted nothing more then peace and for all people to be treated right and fairly, never to starve or go cold. He hated Gabriel. The man murdered that army and here he was, almost a thousand years later, still killing people. Connor didn’t want to think anymore of the bastard.

He did find it interesting though of how the chraeon worked. How was he able to kill an entire army and not have gotten a scratch or scrape on him. He must have been able to move at incredible speed. And why did he not tire? The chraeon must have something to do with it. No sense in wondering what he might never find out though.

Coming out of his thoughts, Connor feels his arms have fallen asleep without him noticing. He struggles to move them from behind his head and lets them lay by his sides. After a few minutes, the sensation is still there, but it is worse then before. He would have rubbed one to get the blood back into it, but they both felt the pin and needle affect and he couldn’t make either cooperate, so he just lay there. After a few more minutes of the same and no change, Connor starts sweating. What if they aren’t just asleep. What if that pain comes back and doesn’t go away. But that made no sense. He had touched the gauntlet with his right hand, and his right arm was what got the shock. Here, both his arms felt the same.

Just as he is about to call out to Shila for help, the feeling in both his arms abruptly disappears.  Relieved, Connor rubs first one then the other just to be sure. They both work fine. He wipes the sweat from his face, taking a deep relieved sigh. There was no pain in either of them. They felt perfectly fine, except for another weird feeling that he was barely able to distinguish. Connor wasn’t even sure if he was feeling something at all, maybe it was just the after effects of his arms falling asleep. Except he thought he felt it in his chest to. As he wondered about it, the feeling seemed to not be there at all, but when he thought about other things it returned, or at least he thought it did. He wasn’t sure which it was.

Suddenly feeling how tired he is, Connor rolls over on his side and falls fast asleep, his last thoughts fading with the enveloping darkness.

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