Tirren watched the roadside blearily from his vantage point holding the reins to the 046, transport carriage. The carriage housed nine inmates. One of them sang incessantly, and after days on the road after the other prisoners had attempted to mock him into silence and failed, they had submitted to his tireless vocalizing.

  “Do you have any songs from Direthos?” One of the prisoners asked.

  “Oh yes, of course I do.” The prisoner leapt into song.

  “The Wind danced among the trees while stars fell from the sky.

  And in the breeze, nature sang, and its voice was carried high.

  To sing the praise of love found pure and long and strong and deep.

  Between the fair summer sun and twilight's pink sky.

  That started at the beginning of time and refused to lie.

  When the earth was one and unbroken, the summer sun grew strong.

  And once he mastered himself he beat the stone to sand.

  Come oh sing now of the prophesied king.

  He who freedom and peace bring.

  He breaks those chains with which we’re tied

  And answers prayers of those who’ve died.

  Bring, bring, the awaiting king.

  Josephus, Josephus, Josephus.

  It had been a long trip. Tirren stopped listening to the crazy prisoner.

  In the seven months since he had progressed to Tree Seidren, Tirren had apprenticed to Gub Shortbear, an old military captain who had retired to Tirren’s home village, but retained an emeritus status, and he had spent his time teaching Tirren what he could, and helping him. Tirren had been glad for it, but thought that true Seidren training would entail less running, working out, and listening to lectures on the nature of leadership.

  It seemed that all leadership training simply amounted to people talking in fine circles, but never approaching a point. They would lead with language like “applied compassion”, and then give several examples of their leadership, but never teach principles. Tirren tired quickly. When he had been given responsibilities, it had been a welcome reprieve from his training so Tirren had gladly agreed to the delivery of several inmates from the local constabulary to a neighboring town.

  There was a high pitched noise that slowly grew in volume, but started very softly and as it got louder Tirren stood up and looked in every direction, anxious to find any threat. Any direction that is, except upwards. At the last moment he cast his eyes upward and saw a massive fireball plummet into the forest, not far from his position on the road.

  It shook the ground magnificently, and the horses spooked, throwing Tirren into his seat until he could wrestle the reins, and the horses were again wrangled to a standstill.

  He quickly set the park break on the carriage and looked around for the source of the unexpected explosion. Having decided which direction he suspected the sound, Tirren began creeping that way carefully, moving from trunk to trunk in order to avoid detection. When he arrived at the source of the explosion, he was greeted by a gouge in the ground at least twenty feet across which furrowed into the ground deepening as it went across the landscape. The massive gouge in the ground was over a hundred feet long.

  Tirren crept toward the far end of the impact sight, warily watching the sky and all around him to ensure that he wasn’t taken unaware if the mysterious fireball were to repeat.

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  He walked forward, and as he did, he was unable to see anything of note. He leapt down into the hole, and walked around. On his second rotation around the end of the trench, he noticed something. It was a single ring, with a sigil on it, like a lord’s ring. Tirren didn’t immediately recognize the sigil, and he approached it cautiously.

  Tirren did one more circle for good measure around the curious ring, but it availed him no new information.

  Tirren did the highly understandable, but very stupid thing. He picked the ring up.

  YOU WHO DARES TAKE IN HAND THE VESSEL OF IVARMARKTARIUS, THE FELL LORD, FEAR AND KNOW YOUR INSIGNIFICANCE!

  Tirren screamed. His fist had involuntarily tightened on the ring. He shook his hand but the muscles had spawned closed over the ring. The voice continued.

  A PUNY MORTAL LIKE YOU IS NOT MY FIRST CHOICE, BUT I GUESS I WILL SETTLE WITH THAT WHICH I COULD FIND.

  Tirren watched fearfully as he involuntarily placed the large ring on his own finger. It was accompanied by a manic laughter in the deep voice of the strange presence in his mind. Terrin’s mind raced, and it defaulted his typical response to fear.

  “Get out of my head!” Tirren yelled into the empty forest, and it seemed to be absorbed by the trees and die.

  I AM ONE THE EIGHT FELL LORDS, WE REIGN IN THE LAND OF THE FELL, WHO ARE YOU TO SPEAK TO ONE SUCH AS I?

  Tirre found that he was required to wrest control of his own mouth away from the incredible presence invading his mind. He grunted as he forced the words out.

  “I am Tirren Stjern, I am a seeker. I am the personal assistant to the retired regional deputy commander guardsman. I am Seidren. I will not be taken. You are a demon.”

  Tirren, like most Serventian children, knew about demons, or genies. Different people called them different things, but one thing was certain. They were evil spirits from the land of the fell. They were summoned to this world, and they had the power to possess people and magical items. Tirren had never met one, but of course, a ring that had come from the sky in a magical comet. He should have known better, but the evil presence would not have him easily.

  Tirren was unaware of the eyes that watched him from the shadowy forest as he wrestled for his free will. With an enormous heave of willpower, Tirren screamed and put every ounce of effort he could into moving his arms. After what felt like lifting the corner of the barn by himself, his body responded, and he took one step. Then another. He struggled out of the crater, each step a massive struggle. His head snapped up and he heard a commotion from the direction of the way of his carriage, it was a definitive squeak, that he recognized as the door. His inmates were escaping.

  Each step was agony, and took every bit of concentrated effort Tirren could muster. The demon in his mind had quieted since he had begun fighting.

  YOU WOULD RESIST ME? HOW ARE YOU DOING THIS? YOU ARE A PUNY TREE SEIDREN. I AM IVARMARTARIUS!

  “Can I call you Mark?” Tirren quipped through the strain.

  YOU WOULD MOCK ME? IVARMARKTARIUS IS A NAME WHICH CAUSES LEGIONS TO BOW IN MY HOME.

  “Whatever you say, Ibermachus. I’ve got a job to do.”

  The demon roared, and Tirren was forced to stop his labored walk in order to keep control of his limbs as the ring’s presence raged against his tenuous control of his free will.

  When he had a tentative grasp on his own body, he began to jog back to the road. He watched a small figure help a robed woman down from the carriage bed, the inmate was still wearing the mana-restricting cuffs which were standard use in the Servintis Guard.

  Tirren shuffled as quickly as he could over, and as he did he heard.

  “Master, I am here to save you!”

  Severin? My laziest and worst disciple? How have you found me?

  “I never stopped searching, master!”

  Opening his manasight quickly, in the reliable way he had been taught his first day in the guard, Tirren noticed that the boy, Severin, didn’t have a mana signature at all. He was not even root level. The prison-breaking boy’s master had a horrifying manasign visible to Tirren. It faintly reminded him of the Letter I. Mana theorists who told of this level of progression called it Opal, the first of the mineral stages.

  The woman still had her manacuffs and third-eye blinder on, so she was severely restricted.

  When progressing, Seidren’s bodies were heightened with each stage, some more than others. Tirren knew that the captive Seidren was faster, stronger, and quicker than any simple mortal.

  In a similar manner, Tirren would also be stronger than the boy with no mana, so when he shouldered the powerless disciple out of the way, he tried to be gentle. The boy was still thrown into the bushes. It was with frightening insight that he realized the rogue Seidren could likely overpower him physically just as quickly.

  Tirren took his mana rod, which was a light club designed to receive his mana into the tip for added weight. He poured his mana into the mana rod and he swung it at his opponent’s head. Quicker than he thought possible, the manacled hands were up, and she caught the blow on her forearm. It elicited a growl from the recipient, but that was it. The Seidren spun in a quick circle and her bundled hands hit Tirren in the chest and he had a flash of deja vu as he was also thrown off the road, he rolled once, then came to rest quickly against a tree. His head slammed into the tree, arresting his surprisingly vigorous momentum.

  He blacked out.