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The Life of Koriaz Sheznar Chapter One - Treachery of Tradition
By Dominic Urbanowicz

I was born -27 AWU (after whole unity) and a new calendar system was created, after the sealing of My nine companions and I. Before that horrible time of eternity imprisoned, no calendar or time system was used. Before us there was no need to go back into history as it was all regular and unnoteworthy... until us. Time was only kept in memory and we were the first event to linger unbeknownst in memory for ages to come.

I came into this world in a dreary village of the kingdom now called Lemdor. In those days, the land was united, rulerships proportioned and spread across a prosperous and great monarchy. Fighting and war were non-existent, peace was a law. Something must have been amassing beyond the vision of the peoples populating this kingdom or any land of the world, for Followers suddenly appeared.

Followers who had at first no inkling as to what they were following but in the end had it etched in their hearts and constantly upon the compass of their travels. The followers came to the first assumption that they had come into cognizance because the world had grown slumbersome, fat and all too quiet in its peace.

They had to prepare, for the Master's Coming. They had to try to usurp the natural equipoise of existence and unleash Him onto the Planet Idap. Visions guided them; the voice bid them to follow for a cause yet unknown and unspoken since inception. Deep within them they intimate themselves with their journey, what they feel in response to achieving the Master's coming is something never felt before, but they like it all the same. The world shuns the unknown, and I, Ko, then Koriaz was implicit in the act of forcing the unknown upon the world. Bringing the end of their joyous reverie. Bringing them nightmares.

The village was named Torvant Spring, namely because of the hot spring that was centred in the village. All that resided worshipped Goddess Loma, the bastion of the virtues Love and Unity. The small shrine erected in her honour by the shore of the spring was erected in her praise and served a basic purpose of centralizing the village.

I never liked the idea of worshipping someone that I never saw or felt and as such believed non-existent. Nevertheless, tradition forced me to visit the shrine every seventh sunset to offer my thanks for her vigilant and constant presence around us. Half-bent I would feel my mouth sour during what would have otherwise been a pretty and pleasant twilight when I realized that this was a waste, a terrible waste of time. I could see no awareness or higher power trying to intercede against "Chaos" upon the behalf of the lowly human. So here I was grovelling to nothing!

When I was little, I didn't play outside much nor have much contact with my peers. For this reason I was considered apart and this in itself was a cause of concern. The villagers were so closely knit that no one had mysteries or aspects that were unknown. I was a bit odd you could say but my mother tried to shame me into the ways of Loma and all that, by scaring me with another fable, The Dead One.

The friends that I did have, their names I cannot recall, were similar to me in one aspect. We questioned instead of followed and had to put up with that tired old tirade of divergence from the path of Loma leads only off a cliff or some babble. Our inquisitiveness led us to indulging in the wrong. Not the backside strapping, calling people names wrong but the morally and socially wrong. Its not like we were criminals, infact, sitting here now I can recall how pioneering our little coven of damsels were, for that age.

I was the best at stealing in my group. I would never get caught and I will never forget when my friends and I undertook the journey to Tarinvaille, the largest town known to us. I had to tutor my friends along the way, it was patience trying but we returned with packs fuller than when we left. I still wear the iron rune around my neck that I stole off some merchant that day. Naturally what we stole arose suspicion but we wormed our way around it.

On our visit to Tarinvaille I went to the library. Books were a rarity, libraries even more so and taking advantage of the opportunity, I filled my pack mostly with books. Musty old ones with titles that appealed to me. The library was where I spent most of my time in that town. I was intrigued by this sullen, empty place that was crammed full of so much yet so hidden to many.

Most of the books I sold back home but the one I kept was ancient. It had a name engraved on its front leather cover. Xekh. It was full of hieroglyphs and strange symbols but opening that alien tome and trying to uncover the meaning would tantalize my mind for hours on end.

Anyway, when we returned, we became the talk of the village. Everyone wanted to hear the talk of the town. This must have been the most exciting thing to happen in our little village since... well, ever I suppose, at least for generations.

Boys hung around us like flies, the other girls thought it was flattering, I found it annoying. After reading and tasting what was a paltry attempt of larger life, I knew no simple peasant could hold my attention. As I was turning seventeen, the Sorority of Torvant Springs decided it was time for me to marry. My friends were slowly drifting away from me when they realized what my favourite book was. They were not as serious as I was, they just wanted to have some fun whilst still young then be fat wives to their hard working husbands. The more they drifted away from me, spending time with boys and what not, the less I cared about them and the time we spent growing up together. I had more important things to do with my time anyway, like trying to annul the possibility of this marriage.

I had a plan devised. The Sorority wanted to marry me off to Daiss in'Bellnor. He had approached me on several occasions and I remember coyly leading him on. All during this time I was studying the Xekh tome trying to decipher its text. I could not read the words but I felt a power building within me as I tried, willed myself to understand. Sometime, I cannot recall when, I unlocked a spell out of the tome. It was in me, intimate knowledge of how to explode flesh with fine weavings of shadow element. I practiced on animal victims but I intended Daiss to be my first human victim.

Daiss was not really a bad person, to be married to or not. He was handsome, sandy complexion and blond hair with a lopsided grin of mischief but nevertheless he was too short and boring for me. I was unnaturally tall for most people of the village were short and blond. My hair was jet black also. Most of the people of Torvant Spring and the neighbouring villages did not vary much in hair or skin colour so I was somewhat an anomaly and I guess this is what Daiss found so attractive about me.

This I can recall with crystal clarity. I arranged to meet Daiss after the seventh sundown and its subsequent prayings at the shrine near the spring. He was very excited and I didn't have any doubts that he was boasting to all his friends about it.

I came early that night. I arrived home after the ordeal at the shrine and got ready, combing my long black hair to a lustrous shine. The moon was now full and casting its reflection on the calm surface of the spring. Where was he?

I heard a faint scraping in the bushes behind me and kept my head down as Daiss came out and sat next to me on the green embankment of the spring. It was very quiet and beautiful in a serene way. I felt calm and resolved in the choice I had made.

He was thinking of something to say when I directed my gaze at him. He flushed a pale crimson and lowered his head. 'Paah, what a coward', I thought. "You're really pretty Koriaz", he muttered half to himself. I giggled girlishly and forced myself to blush to give the pretence of womanly embarrassment. It worked; he took it for real.

"I... um, ah", he stammered. He took a deep breath and steadied himself somewhat, even looked at me with his eyes. "I really like you..." and he trailed off again searching for the right words. I laid a hand on his shoulder and his stammering abruptly stopped. This made him jump a little and I could feel the twitching of nervous tendons under my palm. Admiration shone in his eyes, intermingled with fear. I smiled warmly at him to placate the fear. "I like you to Daiss, I want you to marry me".

His face burned to a bright red, bright even in the moonlight and he carefully, lovingly took my hand off his shoulder. It took a while to gather his composure and gaze at me with soft eyes and say...

"Yes, I will marry you. You will be mine, I will be yours..." at this point I stopped listening lest I cringe. It was every mans duty to recite the Litany of Ardor, which was taught to them by their fathers, to the women they would marry. Since Loma was our goddess this speech was necessary and part of tradition.

When he finished he put his arm around my waist; my skin crawled at the touch. He leaned forward to kiss me and I then I released my anger at him and slapped him full force in the face. He was astounded, shocked to the core. What I had just done was simultaneously slap Loma, tradition and Daiss in the face. All of them I despised.

What would he do now? I stood up and studied his hurt expression. Surprise was the least justifiable term for what I saw. Shock and horror describe it much better.

As soon as the Litany of Ardor was spoken, you were sealed, with love and commitment to each other. It had always been so in Torvant Spring and every other Loma-worshipping village. I had committed a foul blasphemy and the realization of it made me smile, like I had never before.

"I never loved you, you ugly pig-man bastard', I hissed. As an afterthought I spat out "Piss-face!" Swearing was not used either by anyone who worshipped Loma.

" I hate you, I hate your mother and father for creating you and I hate Loma!" His jaw dropped in astonishment. He went ashen. I was so angry at him for being a stupid peasant man that I slapped him again, this time so hard that it stung my hand and even made my eyes water from the tingling running up my arm. I was about to slap him again with my other arm when he stopped my hand mid-flight with a firm grip on my wrist.

He looked at me with misery and pity.

"I must take you to Nanas you make you better. It must be a fever', he breathed the word 'must' as if any other possibility was inconceivable. He began to try to pull me in the direction of the wisewoman's home.

I could have drawn out this debacle longer, by pretending to feint and really be ill but I was impatient. Images of birds exploding mid-flight fuelled me to act.

With my free arm I raised it to the sky and began to draw out the power of shadow from the atmosphere. The energies inflamed my arm at first but then numbed it as I focused it towards the tips of my fingers. A dark ball of boiling black mist began to form just above my fingertips. It grew with each passing moment.

Since shadow was the element I was most acquainted with I drew more and more, testing the limit of my channelling. The ball grew solid and darker still, darker than my hair, darker than the feathers of a raven. I blended and shaped the flow into a large sphere now, that urged to be released; it crackled with silent azure fire.

Daiss glanced over his shoulder to see why I wouldn't budge. I released the ball and it automatically sought out life to quench. It struck Daiss in the face and he let out a heart-lifting yelp as it struck him in the chest. The blackness broke and slithered around his body like hyper speed lizards. His eyes glazed over and he let go of me. The lizards turned into probing tendrils and they sunk into his mouth, nose, ears. Through the pores of his skin it burrowed even, seeking any open orifice to defile the flesh within. His face went red and he began to choke as the life was being devoured inside. The alteration in this weaving allowed the victim to remain conscious until the shadow attacked his brains.

He was struggling to stand now, knees buckling, sweat making his swelling purple face shine in the moonlight. Subconsciously I directed the tendrils that writhed of their own accord up to his brain. I saw with great pride as the tendrils sprang through his neck and stood out like cords of muscle. Daiss's head exploded, like a majestic firework, blood and skull fragments scattering everywhere. I laughed with pure glee as a fountain of blood arced three feet high into the air from the stump of his neck. Such was the power of the silent explosion that no fragments were discernable as once being human.

Finally, the body fell with a flop onto the ground, completely lifeless and still apart from the blood pulsing weaker and weaker out of the neck. I looked around to see if anyone noticed anything. The lanterns that peppered the walls and doors of the abodes were unlit. Then I felt a little foolish as I stared at the remnants of Daiss's head. The spell made no noise, his head had exploded silently. An excellent element to channel, shadow.

I grinned like a little girl who had satisfied her sweet tooth. I felt powerful. With air I lifted the body and dropped it into the spring. Strangely it sank instantly and that was all I had to do. There was no blood on me so I went home, had a quick supper and fell asleep soundly, tired from the evening's excitement

END OF CHAPTER ONE

By Dominic Urbanowicz.
In chapter two, the banishing of Koriaz Sheznar, the main character awakens to herself and has to leave the village of Torvant Spring as the result.