Two - Magic

Enna and Eillim made a fantastic team, along with Faste in the fields and Lasin in the kitchen and the head of the household staff.  The team ran the house and the family business as well as any of their predecessors.  The twins became to Siol what the people had always hoped and expected.  They shared their wisdom and gifts with the people, allied themselves with the politicians and leaders they agreed with, and supported what groups and movements they could.  Bonds were secured with other twinned siblings in other districts and cities around the world.

Though their first experience with combining their gifts had not resulted exactly as planned, they understood the enormity of what had been accomplished.  When they talked about what had happened, about what they felt, they found they were in agreement about how they should proceed.

They eased off of the combination experiments at first, practicing and dabbling with spells smaller than attempting to save a life.  But they did still experiment, and little by little they came to depend on the duality of magic working as one.  They felt the immense power with every blessing spoken or incantation read, and they enjoyed it.

Their dabbling couldn’t have gone unnoticed.  They were quite powerful and sent their waves through the dwindling magical communities.  But it was not other practitioners of the old magics that Enna and Eillim should have worried about as they roped opposing forces together to use them as one.  They never paused to consider any opposition at all.

When they were twenty-four they prepared to work a combined spell that they hoped would shift the weather patterns a few degree to the north.  This was not the first weather change they’d attempted, but they never went about such large scale changes without intense study beforehand.  In this case they were worried both for their own community and those in the highest mountain provinces.  The north was languishing in a murdering drought while the lands around Siol drowned in flash floods and near constant rain.

They laid out their tools and herbs; their stones and minerals.  They worked without speaking seated facing each other within their circle.  They lit their candles together at the center of their sacred space.  Enna poured a line of sea salt from her left, Eillim a line of dark chalk from hers.  They met in the center of the circle, the two different grits sifting together into a blended heap, and then set their bowls aside.

Eillim felt a twinge in her belly as Enna spoke a blessing to a deity the Ariv’ta had despised for generation.  Eillims breathing grew more rapid as the thoughts of the war and slaughter of her tribal ancestors washed over her.  She clenched her hands into fists, desperately resisting the urge to launch herself across the salt-chalk line and rip her sister’s throat out.  Enna did not notice Eillim’s struggle as she concentrated on her own incantations. 

When Enna finally looked across their circle Eillim had succeeded in slowing her breathing and calming her thoughts.  She had not been able to clear her features of the pallor and Enna noticed it immediately.  Eillim had been terrified of what she’d felt; it had drained her.

“What is it Ellie?” Enna asked. She sat forward, almost reaching across the line to touch Eillim but her hand hung stationary in the air.  Neither could cross that line without contaminating the area, they would have to start again.

“Something doesn’t feel right,” Eillim said.  She ran her eyes over the objects laid out before them.  She hoped for some mislaid charm of Enna’s, or one made incorrectly that would react harshly with her presence there.

“Then we’ll stop,” Enna told her simply. “Say your blessing and we’ll shut down.”  She read her sister’s thoughts as she spoke next. “Maybe I have a charm in here I shouldn’t, maybe we can recast later today. Or tomorrow.  She smiled but Eillim saw a bit of nervous hesitation. “Maybe the wind is just coming in off the sea.”

Eillim nodded and tried to smile.  ‘Off the sea’ was one of their old sayings.  A wind off the sea could do amazing things, but one never risked casting if something felt wrong.  Eillim focused on her blessing.  Even without casting a thing she could not leave the circle without recognizing her deity.

Eillim felt the shock again deep inside as she spoke the first lines of her blessing.  She heard Enna grunt in pain and looked up to see the blonde twin doubled over with her arms wrapped around her middle, her hair was hanging in her face.

“Nini!” Ellim gasped.  Enna was flickering into transparency and back again.  Eillim saw the desk on the other side of the room right through her sister’s body.

The room began to shake.  Everything rattled around them and Eillim lunged forward, intending to cross their barrier and grab her sister before Enna disappeared.  A crack of thunder sounded overhead and the burst of bright white lightning blinded her.

Her momentum toward Enna kept her going, but she impacted only hard gritty paving stones under her palms.  She sat up and looked around, breathing hard and utterly confused.

She and Enna stared at each other from opposite sides of an empty archway in the center of a large crumbling room.  It must have once been a castle turret, now gutted of everything but the winding staircase built directly into the curved wall, and sheared jaggedly off above them to reveal the bright blue sky.  Arrow slit windows ran in a parallel spiral to the staircase. The stairs ended in a deadly rock strewn drop-off about 100 feet above their heads.

The archway between them was only a frame, standing independently of any other supports.  Enna stared at is as she gained her feet.  Stepped through it unceremoniously and slipped her fingers into her sister’s.

“Where are we?” Enna asked as Eillim squeezed her hand.

“They don’t know where they are?”  A hard voice demanded from above them.  The girls turned to stare at the creature standing on the uppermost step above them.  He had not been there a moment before.  He gazed down at them.  “They locked us here together and they don’t even know where it is that they now stand?”

“My guess,” Answered a second, lighter voice from behind them, “Is that they do not even know us.”

The girls turned toward each other as they looked over the shoulders at the flowing morphing cloaked shape behind them.  The twins’ eyes locked for a moment in consideration.

Enna glanced at the creature coming slowly down the stairs. “That’s the Foxen isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Eillim agreed and looked at the ghostly shape behind her. “And Svanir.”

They considered the implications of meeting their gods like this in a single breath of silence.

“Odious,” Enna murmured.

“Indeed,” Eillim agreed and turned to watch the Foxen approach.  Enna shifted to study Svanir.  The girls circled each other slowly, watching as the two deities approached them from either side.

The Foxen had been the only thing the Ariv desert tribes agreed upon.  He was their God and guide and he looked as vicious as the legends proclaimed him to be.  Eillim found him beautiful, though Enna could hardly stand to look at him.  His body blended smoothly between man and beast, long and fur covered legs with powerful feet and claws, and a man’s broad chest and arms, fur growing thickly from his elbows down into his paw-like hands.  His fierce snout could grin as well as snarl, and his tall pointed ears flopped lazily to create a deceivingly puppy-like quality. 

The Foxen displayed twisting scars and tribal tattoos over the places where he bore no fur.  From the belt that sat around his hips hung a whip that, according to legend, he used to slay the unfaithful.  The whip ended in a woven flat shaped somewhat like an oval leaf.  It was made with razor wood, the center netting woven from the hair of his defeated enemies.

Eillim could hardly see Svanir, only sensed an uncomfortable shifting area and stared through air that didn’t seem steady.  Enna’s eyes roved over the cloaked Svanir who only hinted at the presence of a body, constantly shifting from one form to another under the floating wrappings.  The only static feature was the deep cowl and hood and her long twisting tail. None had seen the face of the mother of every old God on the Eastern continent since she had given birth to the first of her thousands of children, all of them gods and demigods.

The twins came to a stop in their circling before the deity of her sister.  Enna could smell the dry scent of the Foxen and Eillim attempted to find some piece of Svanir to focus her eyes upon.

“They do know who we are,” Svanir said finally, “At least they are not fools.”

“They show no fear,” The Foxen answered, “That alone makes them fools.”

The sisters turned away from the god before them and bowed to their own.  Eillim dropped to one knee before the Foxen who laid one heavy, clawed paw on her head.  Enna’s bow was more demure and though she raised her hand in blessing, Svanir did not touch the girl.  The twins did not see the burning gaze shared over their heads between Svanir and the Foxen, but they could feel the heat of anger and vengeance radiating between them.

“Stand up, my dear,” the Foxen crooned to Eillim and she rose.  Enna straightened as well.  The girls linked hands and moved a step away from the gods.

“Why have we been brought here?” Enna asked.

“You?” the Foxen snarled. “Why have you been brought? Why have we been brought here!? Over and over and over throughout the years.  By you!” he pointed at Enna and she cringed.  He turned on Eillim and this time his voice shook dust and pebbles out of the crumbling tower wall.  His anger was mounted tenfold on his own child. “And you. Why did you bring us here together?”

Eillim winced at the force of his shout and she squeezed Enna’s hand.  She hoped her sister would not fear.  Eillim willed her sister not to disappear.

“You have been tampering with powerful things,” Svanir’s low voice held a cutting anger all its own.

“Why are we here?” Eillim repeated the unanswered question.

“You are here because the two of you played at your little experiments to combine my power with his,” Svanir glared at the brooding Foxen. “And now you have bound us here. We are trapped together, and we aren’t going to let you leave until you free us.”

“Do you know what we are going to do to you?” the Foxen grinned, swishing his fluffed tail.

“Enough, savage!” Svanir snarled at him.

The Foxen’s whip was suddenly in his huge paw.  The flat net at the end of the long whip left a scorched print on the stones beside Svanir’s feet.  She floated calmly, a few inches above the ground, nonplussed.

Enna and Eillim watched the two opposing forces approach each other.  When they came within a few feet of touching the air between them began to spark and snap with bursts of bright fire.  They stared at each other through the storm they were creating and the girls looked on.

“You have used us,” the Foxen said finally, and tore his eyes from his lifelong nemesis. “And now it is time for us to use you.”

“No,” Eillim spoke firmly.

“No?” Svanir whispered, her voice held an amused lilt. “You don’t have a say any longer, savage.  You have sullied me with his stench and now you must obey us.  You will make your choice.”

“Choice?” Eillim asked. “What are we to choose?”

“You’ll see,” Svanir answered.

“How are we meant to release you?” Enna asked.

“You’ll see,” the Foxen growled.

He clapped his hands and walked away from them.  The ground rumbled under their feet and in a flash everything had changed.  The blue sky went dark, the shadows grew and thunder cracked.  The empty arch was now filled with a glimmering image.

The twins turned to the arch with their hands still clasped.  They could not know that the image was different to each of their eyes.

“Go on through, girls,” Svanir coaxed

“I’d listen to her,” The Foxen agreed “Because if you stay here, you’ll surely die.”

Enna and Eillim considered each other a moment and stepped through the filmy image stretched within the freestanding arch, fingers still locked in an unbreakable grip.

To Be continued... Come back next monday for part 3 Entitled 'Shadow'