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Witch Hunt by Portius
Runner Up for March 2017
Tosha gave me wisdom. He gave me control over myself. He did not give me a purpose. That gift came from the Empire. Not from Celest, though their priests gave me a silver star to wear around my neck. Not from Hallifax, though its crystalsingers wrought the lantern that focused the magic of my order. Not from Gaudiguch, though they forged a sword for me that cut with the fury of a sandstorm. My purpose came from the Empire itself, the union of all those who understand that civilization is the rightful inheritance of the shards.
The forestals deny that purpose, but it is their nature to lie. Why should I expect any less? The gods shaped nature like a potter shaping clay. It is not the place of the pot to make demands of the potter. Why should we, who are the rightful heirs to those who shaped nature, take commands from it? It is our right to rule over it, and shape it to our will. To condemn that is to condemn the gods who fathered us.
But condemn it they do. I know their wickedness and I know their ways. I have seen the arts of wood-witches, who make slaves of themselves before the fae in return for the slightest favors. I have seen the folly of druids, who tend to trees as though they were children. I have seen their tricks and I have seen their wrath. I have opposed those who tried to tear down the great works of our empire through methods both gross and subtle. I have set out upon seven hunts, and I have never failed.
Knowing that, how could I not come to Magnagora? Our august ruler had decreed that a city should rise from nothing, and that an edifice of power should be built there. Such a grand dream. The primitives would oppose it, of course. The wild land must be made to accept the will of its masters before the city can rise, and it is their nature to rage against that. Duty called me to Magnagora, and I was not one to shirk my duty.
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Joy seized my heart as I arrived. Tall walls of rammed earth and sharpened stakes were already rising. It is true that they lacked the beauty of the sandstone walls of Gaudiguch, or the supreme grace of the Hallifaxian spires, but they would serve. They would keep the city safe from those who would harm it. They would do their duty, just as I would do mine. I praised them in my heart, but I did not pass through the walls. It is the great irony of the world that those who would defend the ways of civilization must do their work in the wilderness.
No, it fell to me to journey further, to pass into the mountains where men carved the very bones of the world so that others could build their homes. The city could not grow without the quarries, but they were far from the walls, and exposed to great danger. Nor were they secure from the more subtle threats of the world, from the beguiling words of a witch or the fearsome warnings of a druid, for the workers were men of brute strength rather than wisdom.
I went to the foreman first, as is always the custom. I asked if he had seen any ill omen, or if any savages had come down from the peaks with threats and curses. He denied me, and I asked again. Three times he denied me, and then I took my leave. That was not the end of it, for I knew better than most that fear and folly can cloud a man's mind until he would deny a truth that is right in front of him.
I went among the workers next, to watch them as they brought the mountains to heel. They worked with the slowness of those that hate their work or fear for their future. They jumped at every noise, and they watched the horizon more intently than their own work. I spoke with them, and they freely told me of their fears, for they had a scrap of hope that I might make them safe once again.
It was a story that I had heard many times before. There were tribal fools near that place, men and women who held the world and its spirits to be sacred. The workers knew of them, and had taken care to keep the peace by staying away from their territory, but it had not been enough. Their savage witch took the work of civilization as a terrible blasphemy, and sought to defend the mute rocks that she held to be her master. The tribesmen thought that the workers might intrude on their territory, or else that they might provide plunder to a canny raider. In either case, they were eager for battle. Thus the witch had gone forth to shower the workers with threats and curses, and they feared for their lives.
Duty compelled me to aid them, but sympathy made me a willing worker. I felt the spirit of my people rising in my heart, and it stirred me to great action. I had the scent of a hated foe, and the anger that came from seeing an unjust threat against imperial progress. I took deep breaths, and I fell down to my knees. I meditated there in the quarry, even as the workers stared at me in fear and confusion. I conjured the image of great Tosha into my mind, and I focused on it utterly, until my wrath turned to focused hate. I took to my feet and ran into the mountain, howling and drawing my sword as I went. I hunted.
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Most mortals act only when they are forced to act, either by circumstances or by some greater master. Thus, I knew that I had only to kill the witch in order to destroy the bulk of the danger. Where was the witch to be found? Likely at some hidden shrine to an insignificant spirit. Even if she was not at such a place, she would come to one eventually. I only had to find a shrine and wait. Where does a man find a shrine to the spirits of the mountains? A cave, a cavern, some dark place where only fools and their hunters go.
I descended into the dark places of the world, where the twin lights of civilization and the sun have never shone. My lantern guided me on the path, but it was a long and tiring journey. I made my way down, I ascended, and I went into the dark again. I wandered through twisting tunnels and confounding caverns, for there were many such places that connected to each other in a perverse parody of a city's streets. I hunted for three days and three nights before I found that which I sought.
To call it a shrine seemed like a gross blasphemy, for it was not worthy of any such title. I saw a cairn that stood before a dark pit, and the stone around it was stained with blood. There was no art or beauty to be seen there, only start proof of primitive devotion. I suppose that it was a temple that was worthy of that which it venerated.
Bones crunched and crackled beneath my feet as I climbed down into the pit, but I did not allow the noise to disturb me. Nor did I allow the darkness to fill my heart with fear as extinguished my lantern. I stood there in silence and calmed my soul as I waited for my prey.
I do not know if she came quickly or slowly, for one cannot judge time in the darkness. I heard her before I saw her. I heard the witch approach, and I heard her dragging some wretched, bleating creature behind her. I lit my lantern, but I covered it with my hand to hide the light for a few moments. Then I began to chant the spells which I had learned from my masters. I chanted slowly, I chanted quietly, but still my lantern began to shine with the full power of my arts.
I uncovered the light as the witch tossed her sacrificial victim, a defenseless lamb, across the pit. I turned my lantern toward her, and she recoiled as the light and power of progress burned at her face. The lamb saw its chance and fled. I saw my chance and climbed up into the fray.
I took joy in it. More than I should have, perhaps, but the one who loves his work always does it best. My teeth were in her neck before she knew what was happening, but I will give credit where it is due. She had the wild strength of a beast that is fighting for its life, and she pushed me away. Her knife bit into me, but I am a shard of Loboshi, and my flesh heals quickly. Ten thousand such blows could not have driven me off!
I surged towards her, just like the falcon dives down onto the quivering dove. My sword did its work. Her blood moistened the red rock beneath us, and she returned to the Wheel of Reincarnation. Perhaps she would be of more value to the world in her next life. I cast her corpse into the pit, where so many of her victims remained, and I toppled the cairn upon her. When her kin came to find her, they would learn that they had no more power in this place.