Through The Storm
Chapter 4 Zarzura, the white city

“People of Zarzura.” Rowida stood next to the Grand Wizard beneath the walls of the white city. “This is my final warning.” She looked at the Grand Wizard as if for confirmation. “You have one week to bring me a green man or a green woman, a willing sacrifice on behalf of the whole city.” “If you want the green aura nation to be spared the wrath of the Grand Wizard and me, you will do as I demanded.”

She again looked at the Grand Wizard. “For by the end of the week, we shall unleash the most powerful Arcanos in existence, The Peace Granter, and every soul in your city will perish.”

She pushed her arm high for all to see something that seemed to cast shadows without light, on her and on the man standing beside her. “Heed my warning well, Zarzura.”

Then she walked back with fast steps to her tent, soon to be followed by the Grand Wizard.

“I hope we don’t have to do this.” She turned to face him. “I don’t want to be the killer of thousands of souls to prove a point.”

“It is against human nature.” the Grand Wizard pulled a chair and sat. “One of them will do it, it has to happen, and if nobody does it, we smuggle out a green man or woman and then use the Arcanos.”

“I really hope it doesn’t get to that.” She rubbed her eyes and then dropped her hand limply at her side. “It would be a terrible waste.”

“Because they were your people?” He asked her with a bemused expression on his face.

“No, it has nothing to do with that.” She sighed. “It will cause a great imbalance in the forces of this world, and permanently affect nature.”

“I am sorry, my love.” He shrugged. “But when you walk the path of war, you have to accept to do just that.”

“Acceptance is different from actually doing it.” She sat hard, facing him.

“Acceptance is the first step in doing a thing.” He waved a hand in the air. “The rest is just a path that has to be walked to connect the beginning to the end.”

“I understand that.” She grabbed the decanter from the center of the table and poured each of them a glass of chilled wine. “But the road from acceptance to the deed should be longer, and should offer forks to change the deed, or at least offer an alternative.”

“It usually does.” He bowed his head as he took the glass of wine, sipped a bit, then said, “This is why I have high hopes that one shall come forward to offer himself or herself.”

She nodded and took a long sip from her glass, then fell back in her chair, deep in thought.

“Charles, we have to succumb to her demands,” a man in his late fifties addressed the ruler of Zarzura. “The threat might be real.”

“Even if it is, what would stop her at one man or one woman?”

“A woman of around her thirties,” countered the opinion of the man.

“Did you consider that we would be her hostages for all eternity if we did what she asked for?”

“Roger is right, Marissa,” a woman around Roger’s age, said. “Even if it means being her hostages, the green nation will survive, and she is but one woman, and one day she will die.”

“Do you understand the implications, Rema?” A younger man charged the older woman, Rema. “This means at least five or six generations of greens would be under her beck and command, and even after she dies, we would be subject to the racist rules of the Order of Purification, never to be our own men and women again.”

“Ramon, nations outlast tyrants, history taught us that time after time.” Rema waved her hand in the air. “Remember Malachi? His family ruled for nine hundred years, but eventually, his family fell, all tyrants do.”

“You want to seal the fate of Zarzura for another nine hundred years? Are you even thinking about what kind of damnation you are sealing our people for?” Marissa shouted at Rema.

“Better damned, and surviving, than dead.” Roger stood less than an inch away from Marissa as he said that.

“Good people.” A tall and broad man in full armor who sat by the corner of the grand hall of the council of Zarzura said, “I have an alternative.”

They all stopped arguing and turned to him, including the ruler of the city, Charles.

“I am not a green, I am not subject to your rules.” “I will give myself to her,” The armored man said.

“Sir Mortimer,” Charles said softly. “You are not the one she wants, she wants a green.”

“Fine, then I will challenge her champion, the Grand Wizard in armed combat.” He sighed. “At least to buy you time.”

“Time to do what?” Roger asked him.

“Time to send messages of urgency to the purples and oranges, since the reds, yellows, and blues are backing the Order.” He hit the parchments placed in front of him. “It takes a pigeon four days to reach El Dorado, and another four to come back.” He shook his head slowly. “And you have only seven days, I can at least buy you this one extra day if I challenge the man on the seventh day.”

“And if he refuses, or if they kill you without a chance to duel with him, then what?” Rema asked him.”

“Then you have to decide within hours the fate of your race, and may the fates be gentle on you.”

“They are sending tens of pigeons each day.” Gertrude held a sheaf of parchments in her hand. “We intercepted most of them, but some passed through.”

“Doesn’t matter. Help will never reach in time, and we are expecting ten thousand more to join our troops from the blues and the yellows,” the Grand Wizard said.

“I still can’t fathom how you tilted their hands.” Rowida laughed. “This completely changed the war map, we are the most powerful among all of Agartha because of this.”

“Every man and woman have a weak spot, a special desire, or a special need.” He laughed. “And I have this small voice in my head that tells me exactly what that is.”

Rowida stared at him for a few moments, could it be that he also made a ‘Deal’? But the signs were not there unless he was such a crafty man to be able to hide them so well.

If you are deliberating whether the Grand Wizard has a contract with one of the Others, rest assured that he is not. The dragon’s thoughts negated Rowida’s own.

Then, what it is? Rowida let a bubble of confusion burst at the surface of her mind.

He talks to the fates, although I don’t think he knows it, he thinks it is his own inspiration.

And the fates just give him council? Just like that?

They can’t help it, he controls destiny, and in turn, controls them.

“You are a formidable ally Grand Wizard.” Rowida leaned towards him and whispered, “And an equally formidable lover.”

“I demand to face your champion in a duel.” Sir Mortimer was sent down the side of the wall of Zarzura by a set of ropes and pulleys, and he now stood in front of the immense army of beast and man.

“One which shall determine the fate of Zarzura.” He drew out his weapon.

“Let your man come at me, I might be old, but I am a master at my craft, and my craft is the sword.” Sir Mortimer, walked slowly with raised arms, waving the sword in intricate figures of eight.

Rowida got out of her tent to the sounds of protest among the ranks, and a red guard stood beside her tent’s flap at attention.

“What is the cause of this commotion?” she asked him.

“A knight has descended the walls to challenge our champion, the Grand Wizard,” the guard said as he pointed to the tiny figure of Sir Mortimer.

“I see,” she said and started to walk fast to the front line.

The Grand Wizard stood with some of his lieutenants as he started to don his armor, preparing for battle.

She arrived at the spot and said softly, “He is just a distraction.”

“I know.” He smiled at her. “This is why I will kill him fast.”

“Is he a green?” She asked the men around the Grand Wizard, and they all shook their heads in negation.

“Then just shoot him full of arrows,” she said to the Grand Wizard.

“But I can take him,” he protested.

“I trust that you can and that it will be a very short fight.” She patted his armored shoulder. “But killing him with arrows, sends a message, one of mercilessness and ruthlessness.”

The grand wizard looked at her with admiration. “You are true to what they call you, the Dragon Lady.” Then he turned to his aides and said, “Do as the lady said, let him be an example of our mercy.”

“Is your champion afraid of me?” Sir Mortimer laughed loud.

Instead of an answer, a hundred arrows flew at him, and in moments he was falling, gurgling on his own blood.

The guards on top of the walls watched the last templar fall, and none could even attempt to help him.

A volley of arrows flew from the walls to the army troops camping outside, hitting nobody as the distance was beyond their reach. And this was the extent of their power, as opening the gate to fight for Sir Mortimer’s body will nullify the power of the magical barrier.

Half an hour later, the ruler of the city stood at the parapets and shouted, “We beseech the leaders of the army, please allow us to retrieve the body of Sir Mortimer, to give him a proper burial in the embrace of our kind mother.”

Ten minutes passed, then Rowida emerged from the lines of beast and men. “No, you shall not do anything of the like.” She scoffed. “The body is a trophy of war, and tonight, as your city dies, it shall feed the beasts.” Then she walked back through the wall of her troops.

“Zarzura, your hour has come.” Rowida looked with worry-filled eyes at the Grand Wizard by her side.

“You have only thirty minutes, then your city burns,” she shouted as loud as she could, lest the message not reach the rulers of the city.

A guard ran down from the wall and raced across the city to the government building. He pushed his way through the running aides and accountants to the council hall.

He entered panting and said, “We have only half an hour, my lords and ladies.” Then he ran out.

“It is settled then, the greens die tonight.” Rema sat with a straight back, looking hard into Charles’ eyes.

“It is the only way out.” He nodded.

“Will we be remembered?” Roger choked on the words.

“Yes, this day will be remembered, and I know that we will not just slip through history,” Ramon said as he bent over the table.

“Then let the greens go down in history as a people who never bent the knee, even under the greatest of threats.” Marissa had tears in her eyes, but she was smiling.

“The Arcanos had been placed in the right places, and when the moment comes, all will be recorded, to the last breath of the greens.” Rema stood and paced the room as she talked.

“Let’s hope the few hours Sir Mortimer bought us were enough.” Charles reached with his hand to the man next to him, Ramon, who, in turn, reached to the others till all joined hands.

“Let us all send the message across time and place to the green boy or girl who shall heed it.” For a moment, all their bodies seemed to glow.

After Half an hour had passed, the Grand Wizard stepped from behind the lines of the troops and raised his arm to the sky, holding in it the Peace Granter. In seconds the sky started to darken, and lightning hit the ground once then twice, as the Grand Wizard chanted something in incoherent words. hen a bright light, like a thousand lightning bolts molded together, hit the center of the city and spread outwards in a circle of devastation.

Holes appeared in the wall of the city just as the light touched them, the guards on top disappeared in a gust of dusty wind. In less than ten seconds, the light died, and the vibration the entire army felt all those months from the magical barrier, stopped.

With a loud shout, the soldiers and beasts descended on the city, ravishing and destroying what remained of it. Survivors were the least lucky of the city populace, as each was slaughtered in inventive ways. Women were ravished by men then given to beasts to feed on them. Men were pulled from their houses and pilled in front of the beasts to feed on. Soldiers ran amok through the beautiful streets and houses of the city, defiling the works of art everywhere and stealing what they could carry, and then some.

Copper artwork in door frames was pulled out, statues were smashed to get to the copper halo and eyes, anything within reach of the soldiers was up for the taking.

As the screams of the last of the greens were silenced, some of the more sensitive reds felt it first, then it was the beasts. The magical barrier was somehow reactivated, and the looters had to abandon the city in a rush as any who dallied, was consumed by the magical barrier advancing from the center of the city outwards, just like the death light the Grand Wizard unleashed hours before.

Zarzura had fallen, but still, the order lost this battle.