A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor
Chapter 1650 - 1650: Swirling Fires - Part 3

He laughed, and he danced, his footprints claimed the virgin snow for his own. Even this part of the country – never mind the cave – was relatively uninhabited. At the very least, no human humans ever dared to reach this far. They could not have known that the mountain upon which he stood, right in the heart of Treeant territory, had once been the home of a mighty hidden castle. Only Magnus knew that, and there was none more selfish in their knowledge than he – that was a secret that he'd quite delightedly take to the grave.

He stretched his shoulders out, when he quickly found that his energy was beginning to give way, and his old lungs gave out a few rasping breaths.

"Oh, I've grown old, old indeed I have grown," Magnus hummed to himself happily. He disliked it not. It was a natural thing. The thought made him titter again, as he realized that by now, or even centuries before, he should have been nothing more than bones in the ground. That he lived at all, with as little energy as he had, that was an act of defiance.

He reached out to the tree that had borne the fleeing bird's nest, and snapped one of its lower branches off. The pine needles had gone orange from lack of sun, and when Magnus looked to check, he found that the branch too had lost all of its green. It was dry enough that it would have burned in a hurry.

He ran his hand down its length, ridding it of all its excess branches, until he had a stick that was sizable enough that it could have been called a staff. He plunged it into the snow, and leaned his weight on it, nodding in satisfaction when it held.

"The skill of the finder," Magnus said, as he began a twirling of the fingers of his left hand, speaking an incantation through them that needed not be said with the mouth. "And the skill of the shaper."

With those words, the wood began to twist and turn. The bark flew from it, and a shine ran on its revealed surface instead, as if it had been lacquered. A wooden orb carved itself into the very top of the staff, and beneath it came a spiralling wind, and then notches, hundreds of them, as if tallying some sort of number. Whatever it was that it tallied, only Magnus knew.

Then there were runes, written in the language of that long dead civilization. Runes that only Magnus knew the meaning of. He had those around and around in belts. The legacy of his time spent there. None would know their significance but him. They would see it, and put it down to magic. He giggled at the very thought.

"And for you, my complaining feet, we ought do better," he said. Another spell, and from beneath the snow, he pulled at the dying grasses, weaving them more delicately than any professional weaver could hope to. He bound them around and around each other, their shape intricate and perfectly made from him, each toe formed separate from the other. When he slipped them onto his feet, the fit was more perfect than any could hope for it to be. He added to them, layer upon layer, until there was a solid inch of his woven fabric between himself and the cold snow.

"Yes, yes," Magnus said, dancing in his new footwear. "Now we are getting somewhere, aren't we? Mhmmmm, yes. It's good to know – it's good to remember. Oh, and it's good to remind those that have forgotten, isn't it? Yes, their little war, their little plundering… If the High King reaches for me, I do believe he'll be reaching everywhere else, won't he?"

Magnus tittered at the thought. "I imagine he's not a stranger to those Blue Flames… Oh, indeed. Yes, a man like that… I believe I've got the measure of him now. He'll be attempting to make use of them, in some way or another. Everything magical, everything sinister… He'll turn that on his enemy, he will. And Blackwell's lot? Would they? Perhaps… There might be one amongst them with the motive too."

He turned to the crow on his shoulder, continuing the conversation for him, as he stroked the creature's feathered chest. "But you see, my dear companion, the realm of magic? Yes? It's mine. Those relics of the past, they belong to me. The entirety of magehood, all the mana in the country. Its rich cloud exists for me alone. I can feel the sapping of that great energy in my time away. There have been mages arisen, and mages fallen, all without my permission. There's cleaning up to do, little one, there is. And this…" He waved the letter in front of the crow's face. "This can wait, until we have firmly regathered what it is that belongs to us."

The crow squawked in acknowledgement, apparently quite happy to have changed allegiance to its master. Magnus grinned, and petted it again.

…

…

"This… Nah, I wouldn't want this," Greeves said, stroking his chin, as he inspected the residents of one of the cleaned out shops. "And where went the bastard that owned it, eh? Fled, didn't he. So he'll have been thinking the same thing as me."

"I wouldn't mind it, Boss…" Judas said, walking around with him, his heavy weight making the floorboards creak. Whoever had owned the store before hadn't been able to quite gather up everything. There were still little baskets full of the less expensive wears – small glass jars, and wooden trinkets, and strange little bangles for the wrist with feathers dangling from them.

"He had shit taste," Greeves said. "I can tell you that. Look at this rubbish? Who'd want to buy this shit? Only in Ernest, I tell ya. It's cheating, it is. We've got to struggle in Solgrim, got to make people look at whatever we're selling. You've got to get the contacts, get out of the town. In here? Apparently, the fools are rich enough to hoover up whatever you put out in front of them."

"But you don't like the storefront bit of business, do ya Boss?" Judas said. "I thought you said it was only for the stupid?"