Fear has settled like a mask on the face of everyone I pass in the castle hallways.
Not particularly surprising given the circumstances. Several hundred years have passed since the Kingdom of Empras was last attacked. When the king acquired the Magestone, he immediately erected the strongest magical wards known in the combined history of every kingdom. For centuries, Empras was untouchable—was.
We’d been attacked. That was the simple truth of it. It had lasted mere minutes, but nevertheless, something had been able to attack us. Lightning had struck inches from the king’s feet, lightning out of a formerly clear, cloudless sky. Lightning sent by someone—or something—who could control the sky itself.
“So this is where you’ve been hiding.” My friend’s voice, worn thin with fatigue, startled me. I didn’t have to turn to see how tired he was; it was there in his tone.
In the wake of the attack, the king ordered multiple layers of additional barriers to be erected around the Magestone. Teams of mages were assigned to stand watch and keep them reinforced day and night. However, twenty days later, we’d been attacked again. A multitude of glowing spheres had penetrated the Magestone chamber, shattered the barriers, and struck the Magestone itself, as though to mock the king’s attempts to defend it. The small cracks in it had widened into deep fissures, some stretching almost the entire height of the stone. Witnesses had seen the spheres shoot through the sky, carving a straight path from the forest toward the castle. Many civilians were among those witnesses, and though they couldn’t grasp the true nature of the lights—an attack—the phenomenon itself was enough to cause unrest among the general populace.
The king was safe. The lightning hadn’t harmed him, only scorched the ground at his feet. Many of the knights had assumed the king’s personal wards had blocked the attack, and at first, I’d thought so too. But once I’d calmed down, I began to wonder: Had his wards really diverted the bolt? The forest border was at least ten days’ march from the castle, and the center, which we believed to house the unknown threat, was several times farther still. The spell had traveled an impossible distance, aimed directly at the king, and struck right as he’d given the order for the forest to be razed to the ground. That meant the being lurking in those trees—whatever it was—could see us. Perhaps it could see the entire world. Otherwise, how could the attack have come at precisely that moment?
“What’s wrong with you?”
“I feel... I feel as though we’re being tested,” I answered.
“Tested? You and me? By who?”
“No, not you and me—this kingdom...” I hesitated for a moment. “By the king of the world.”
I heard him gasp.
Somewhere in all my thinking, I’d come to a realization—one I should have reached long ago. Something was wrong. When the new cracks had appeared in the Magestone, the mages had, after significant investigation, ruled them to be the result of an attack. An attack.
“By something that can completely nullify the power of the Magestone,” I continued.
“What do you mean?”
The Magestone was protected. Wards—even normal ones—neutralized magical attacks, much less wards reinforced by the power of the Magestone itself. It was why Empras hadn’t been attacked in centuries; if anyone even dared to attempt it, their spells would be rendered useless as soon as they came into contact with the first of the many layers.
“To damage something that’s protected by a ward, you first have to destroy the ward, right? There’s no other way.”
“Well, yeah...” my friend trailed off, unsure.
“But the ward around the kingdom isn’t broken. None of our wards have broken.”
He didn’t reply.
The main ward around the kingdom wasn’t broken—and yet, the Magestone had been attacked.
We should have noticed earlier. Perhaps centuries of safety had made us careless. Magical attacks and magical barriers couldn’t coexist—one had to destroy the other if ever they came into contact. The mages, surely, had started to realize the abnormality of the situation. They were probably panicking behind closed doors, desperate to figure out how to tell the king. Empras was, after all, a kingdom that depended on our mages—mages who could protect and strengthen the Magestone. But if our wards were failing, if the mages could no longer be relied on...
I didn’t have to guess what that meant for them.