The Nextworld Invasion and the Death of Magic - 2. Chapter 2 - New Friends

The free peoples of Earth were made up of three very unique races. Along with the green-skinned Urcai, there were the Noktar and the Rothians, and the inter-species culture they developed was unified with nature.

The Noktar and the Rothians were both diminutive races, with individuals growing no taller than four feet, but despite their similarity in height, the two races could not have been more different. The Noktar tended to be stocky, muscular, and very hairy. They matured much more slowly than the Rothians or the Urcai, and Noktar lifespans stretched to more than five-hundred years. Their people were youthful and almost childlike for more than half their long lives. Compared to the Noktar, the Rothians were very petite. They were slight of frame, with long skinny limbs and torsos that were proportionately smaller than Urcai or Noktar, which made their arms and legs seem even ganglier. The Rothians also possessed oversized facial features. Their noses were large; their ears were pointy, and their mouths stretched very wide across their faces.

Deep in the forest to the north of Vuliburge lived a Rothian woman. She dwelt alone in a little hut that stood nestled down in a clearing between two rises in the land. Her name was Nuji. Her skin was the color of sandalwood, and her eyes were bright brown. The Rothian people had coarse black hair, and Nuji kept hers twisted in tidy dreadlocks.

In her youth, Nuji had been banished from the city of Vuliburge under the accusation of murder. Two decades had passed since her exile, and she had lived on her own for those twenty long years.

Nuji was adept at the advanced earthmagic that the Rothian people practiced, and as a young child, she had been accepted as an apprentice by one of her elders. For seven years, Nuji trained and even surpassed her teacher, and she was on the path to becoming one of the greatest young sorcerers in the city, when she accidentally killed her master.

Young Nuji was performing a simple charm that was used to fuse steel and living plant matter. It was a very basic part of the way Vuliburgian buildings grew symbiotically with the living plants of the forest. However, when young Nuji began casting the rudimentary spell, the thaumic energies had flared out of her control. It was not her fault. She had followed every step in the instructions perfectly, and she was not responsible for the thaumic surge that flowed through her. It all happened so fast and was so horrible that Nuji could not stop it. Powers radiated into her that altered the casting of her spell, fusing the steel, the plant matter, and Nuji’s master into a twisted lifeless abomination.

During the later investigation, no Rothian experts were able to determine what had happened to her teacher. None of them understood how the spell went so horribly wrong. No one in Vuliburge was aware that the thaumic flareup had in fact been caused by the Humans. It would still be many years before they were able to break through the barrier between worlds and open the three holes in the sky above Vuliburge, but the Humans were already manipulating the inhabitants of Earth.

When no explanation for the death of Nuji’s teacher was forthcoming, the blame had fallen upon her. She was only fifteen at the time. Despite her denials that she used malicious magic against another living being, the Rothian leaders banished her from Vuliburge. During the two long decades that followed, Nuji had spent very little time with other people.

On an unremarkable evening that felt like any other, Nuji was in her kitchen preparing to make a little food, when she was suddenly surprised by a glorious surge of energy that rippled through the forest like an earthquake of magic. Nuji quivered where she stood, as if raw ecstasy had taken over her entire being for the briefest instant. Then it was gone, but she could feel its source. The location was far from her hut; it was coming from the region of Vuliburge. The power shocked her, and she knew she needed to find the source of the magic. She could feel its specific location, and leaving the food uncooked, she snatched her bag and a few things and raced out of her cottage. The city was several hours away, and despite the oncoming night, Nuji made her way through the trees without stopping until she found what she sought.

As she eventually drew nearer to the source, she was surprised to come upon two green-skinned Urcai men. Neither of them was wearing a shirt, and one was about to pull a knife out of the other’s side.

“No, lads, don’t do that!” Nuji shouted, and she approached the much taller pair. “That wound needs better treatment than anything you’ve got. I’m Nuji. I can help. What are your names?” She turned to the uninjured man for the answer to her question.

“I’m Tigath, and this is Othri. How did you escape?”

“Escape?” Nuji repeated. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She quickly continued. “Tigath, go collect some athriliath, monterial, and fogantria flowers, and see if you can find a bolgrit. Do you know what all those are?”

Tigath turned to Othri as he replied to the limby woman. “The first two are herbs, and the last is a root, right?”

“Correct,” Nuji confirmed, and she ordered, “now get them!”

Tigath’s purple eyes lingered on his beloved for only another instant, and he took off like a flash.

“What’s all that for?” Othri managed to ask with a quavering voice.

Nuji focused on him. “It’s treatment for your injury. Now Othri, can you tell me what happened?”

He squinted at her, and also at a fresh wave of pain that radiated out from the knife in his side. “Don’t you know?” he hissed.

“How could I know how you got stabbed?” she replied.

Othri realized she was ignorant about the burning of Vuliburge. “The Humans,” he said weakly, “somehow they came through from Nextworld. They attacked a few days ago and destroyed the city.”

Nuji’s confusion shifted to disbelief. “What do you mean? That’s impossible.”

Othri’s head was starting to swim in a volatile ocean of pain. “They did it. I dunno how,” he mumbled, and he collapsed.

There was only pain. Othri was consumed by it. He was not unconscious, and there was nothing but the agony in his side. It was as if Othri had become one with the knife, like they had fused into a single being of all-consuming suffering. He could hear Nuji telling him to try and stay awake. He also heard the Rothian woman’s chirpy voice as she greeted Tigath when he returned with whatever items he had found, but as Othri teetered on the brink of unconsciousness, his mind drifted away from reason.

Tigath approached through the trees, and Nuji called out to him. “Tigath, did you find everything?”

He stepped up to her but immediately focused on Othri, who was sprawled on the forest floor. “What happened to him?!”

“Did you get it all?” Nuji repeated as loudly as she could with her squeaky voice.

Tigath looked down at her. “The herbs and the root,” he answered, “but the flowers aren’t in season.”

“Well, we’ll just have to make do without them.”

Nuji set about dealing with the three ingredients, and Tigath knelt beside Othri, who was unresponsive. A flash of light from Nuji drew Tigath’s attention back to the Rothian woman, and she began speaking a mystical language used by her people. Another light flashed as she combined the three components and cast her spell. In less than a minute, she was done, and she turned back to Tigath.

“Hold this,” she ordered, handing him a small dish with a little muddy paste in it. Nuji opened her bag and took out a roll of unused gauze.

“Oh, thank goodness!” Tigath declared at the sight of it.

“Yes, this’ll be more sterile than your torn shirts, but we can still use the longer strips you ripped up to go over the outside and help secure everything around his waist, but this will heal him.” She took the dish back from Tigath and looked into his purple eyes. “You’re going to need to hold Othri down.” Nuji began speaking the other language again. She crouched beside Othri and looked almost childlike next to the much larger Urcai man.

Tigath knelt across from her. He brought one hand to Othri’s muscular shoulder and the other to his side below the dagger’s handle. He looked up at Nuji. Tigath had always found the appearance of the Rothian people to be wondrous, especially when he was a child. Tigath had only befriended a few Rothians in his life, and he had been close with each of them, but he did not like the situation he now found himself in with the Rothian woman.

In one swift movement, Nuji pulled the knife out of Othri. His body shook, and Tigath could not stop his eyes from welling up as he held Othri in place. Blood flowed from the wound, and Nuji quickly packed the opening with the concoction she made from the three ingredients. She pressed a large gauze patch over it and began to wrap Othri’s torso with a longer piece.

“Help me get it around him,” she ordered, and Tigath obeyed. When it was secure, she added, “Now let’s tie some of the strips from your shirt around it to hold everything in place.” A moment later they were done.

Othri was unconscious.

“He needs to rest,” Nuji stated quietly. She put her palms to the Earth and began speaking more of her people’s magical language, and to Tigath’s astonishment, the green trunks of young trees burst forth from the soil. The limbs grew much faster than any natural plant, and they wound together into a wall of braided plants that blanketed Othri and hid him. Leaves sprouted from the covering and blended it with the background of the forest. It looked like any other bush from all sides except one, where a small opening revealed Othri. “Come with me,” Nuji said under her breath, but Tigath was gawking at what she had magicked into existence.

“H-how did… how did you do that?”

“Come over here,” she urged, nodding away from Othri.

“We can’t just leave him,” Tigath retorted.

“We’re not leaving him,” Nuji whispered. “I just don’t want to disturb him.” She led Tigath a short distance away. “I don’t know what he was talking about while you were gone. What happened to Vuliburge?”

Tigath’s mind swirled with the horrible memory, and he absentmindedly ran his fingers through his long purple hair. “You don’t know? The Humans, they broke through from Nextworld and burned the city.”

“That’s what Othri told me. Don’t you have any other information?”

Tigath’s green brow furrowed in thought, and he added, “It was like the sky opened, and the Humans rode through the air on…” he paused and searched for the right description. “It looked like they were riding giant metal insects.”

Nuji turned from Tigath and whispered to the universe at large, “Holes in the sky from Nextworld, why didn’t I feel that?”

Tigath did not understand. “Why do you think you should have felt it?”

She looked back at him. “The spellcraft of my people is common to all of us, and every Rothian can cast at least basic charms, but a few of us are like beacons to the magic. When I was a teenager, unmanageable quantities of thaumic energy were accessible to me, and they got… out of my control. I was forced to move outside the city.” Nuji shook her head in confusion and reiterated, “I should have been able to feel when the Humans broke the barrier between our world and theirs.” She turned back in the direction of her hut. “Well, I may not have felt what the Humans did, but several hours ago I did feel a burst of magic…” she paused, “from here in the forest near you two.”

Tigath glanced toward where Othri was resting and said, “The trees?”

Nuji looked around at the nearby forest. “What about them?”

“I blacked out,” Tigath replied. “Wait, let me back up. It’s the fifth day since the Humans attacked. Othri and I were outside of town when it happened, and we hid in the forest and waited. We were finally headed back to the city to see if they were gone so we could help our fellow Vuliburgians, but we stumbled upon three Human soldiers. They stabbed Othri, and I blacked out. When I woke up again, he told me the trees had attacked and killed the soldiers.”

Nuji frowned, and she repeated Tigath’s words back to him as a question. “The trees attacked and killed the three soldiers?”

Tigath shrugged. “I guess so. I didn’t see it happen, and I didn’t see the bodies afterward, but Othri said it was really bad. The trees just destroyed them.”

Nuji’s mind computed complex calculations at the speed of her thoughts. “Tree magic?” she asked herself.

Before the two of them could discuss it further, a pair of tiny flying creatures appeared between them. The things’ bodies were no bigger than one of Tigath’s thumbs, and they were covered in iridescent feathers. They hovered, with their wings buzzing like hummingbirds’, and they seemed to be observing Tigath and Nuji. The creatures had no arms, and their legs were long and scaly with little clawed feed, however, their faces were similar in appearance to Rothians. Their mouths stretched wide, and both of them had tufts of feathers that stuck out from the sides of their heads like Nuji’s pointed ears. The things possessed eyes like a dragonfly, multifaceted optical organs that shimmered in the darkness.

“Oh my, what lovely little beings!” Tigath said as one flitted closer to him. “Where did you two come from?”

“Are those…” Nuji began, but she was interrupted by a cry of pain.

Tigath had reached a hand toward the creature, and it bit him.

“They are!” Nuji barked. She swatted at the other one as it approached her, but it dodged her strike.

Tigath clutched his bleeding hand and backed away from the vicious thing. His purple locks dropped in front of his face, and he shoved them back with his good hand. “What are they?!” he squawked.

“Dust fairies!” Nuji shouted. She yanked a book out of her bag and swung it at the one nearest to her. “They feed on living flesh! The question is, why are they this far north?” Nuji struck out again, and her book collided with the fairy midair and sent the thing hurtling toward the ground. It let out a tiny screech as Nuji squashed it beneath the heel of her boot. “Rotten, horrid fairies,” she spat, and she rushed toward Tigath.

“It’s going to bite me again!” he wailed, but Nuji was on it.

“No you don’t!” She raised her book overhead and brought it down on the fairy as it tried to take another chomp out of Tigath. Her swing was very close to him, and it slammed into the fairy, which pelted against the ground, dazed and disoriented. It was also squished under Nuji’s boot. “Monstrous things!” She immediately set about treating Tigath’s wound. “I don’t know why they would be so far up here.”

“I didn’t think fairies still existed,” Tigath hissed through his teeth as Nuji applied ointment and a gauze bandage to the bitemark on his hand. Blood was trickling down his green wrist.

“Oh yes,” Nuji replied, “a few wicked species of fairies still exist, but the ones that are left require heat to survive. These two shouldn’t have been anywhere near here, north of Vuliburge.” She wrapped Tigath’s hand and secured the binding.

“Thanks.” He flexed his fingers. “It hurts.”

Nuji nodded. “It’s probably going to hurt for a while. At least those weren’t one of the venomous species.”

Tigath was startled by the information. “Some fairies are poisonous?! Are you sure these aren’t those kinds?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. There are only a few species that are deadly to people. Those two little beasts were dust fairies, like I said. They eat meat, but they usually only attack sleeping people or animals. These ones were acting crazy, and they’re way outside their normal habitat.”

“Nuji, how do you know so much about fairies?”

She flashed him an excited smile. “I was kind of obsessed with them when I was a kid. I always liked sort of weird, out-there stuff, like the tiny monsters we call fairies. Most of their species have gone extinct. Some fairies were scavengers and ate decomposing flesh. Others were flightless and dug little burrows where they waited for their prey. Some species weren’t covered with feathers, and instead they had scales. There were varieties with really long tails, others with no tails at all. There even used to be a species that grew two heads! One type of fairy produced a potent smell from a specialized musk gland, another kind used to spit at its prey to disable it, which is gross. Some dwelt in caves, others in swamps or inside of old trees. There was a species with black feathers that could shed all of its feathers as a defense mechanism, but then it would grow them back in less than a day. The venomous kinds can only survive down near the equator. Only hot-climate species still exist today. The raptor fairies, death head fairies, and those dust fairies can sometimes withstand slightly lower temperatures, but if viper or scorpion fairies get below eighty-five degrees, they become disoriented and can’t fly.”

Nuji paused and looked very apologetic with her exaggerated features. She seemed embarrassed, and she brought her long-fingered hands to her wide mouth and mumbled, “Sorry, you probably didn’t want me to go into all those ridiculous details, while scraping bits of dead fairy from the soles of my boots. Sorry,” she repeated, and she wiped her feet on the forest floor.

There was no sign of any other fairies, but behind them, Othri’s voice called out weakly, “Tigath!”

“Oh no,” Tigath whispered, “are fairies attacking Othri?! I’m here!” he shouted, and he rushed back through the dark forest. “I’m here,” he repeated more quietly as he took Othri’s hand. There were no other fairies. “Are you okay? How do you feel?”

Othri groaned. “Like I had a knife in me.” He looked at his bandaged side and winced. “How did you do this? And what happened to you? Why’s your hand all wrapped up?”

“It’s nothing,” Tigath replied dismissively.

Othri brought his green fingers to the braided covering of plants above him. “What’s this?”

“Do you remember Nuji?” Tigath asked, gesturing at the Rothian woman as she approached. Othri shook his head that he did not, and Tigath continued. “You were already in a pretty bad state when she found us. I know you were playing tough, but that knife really messed you up. She treated you and magicked this.” He indicated the enclosure of twisted plants. “You’ve slept for only a little while, and the sun won’t come up for a few hours, so why don’t you try to get a little more sleep?”

“That’s exactly what you need,” Nuji added in her squeaky voice. She knelt behind Tigath. “Here, have a sip of this.” She extended him a little flask with a cork in its opening. “It’s nothing special, just a little whisperoot tea. I brewed it a month ago. It’s a good batch. It’ll promote your healing.”

Othri accepted it, took a sip, and laid back against the soft forest floor. “I don’t feel good,” he mumbled, and he closed his orange eyes.

“Get some more rest,” Tigath urged, “and in the morning, we can figure out what to do next.”

“Everything will seem a little better once the sun has risen,” Nuji added.

She and Tigath each also had a sip of her whisperoot tea, and they lay down on either side of Othri beneath the camouflaged hiding place. The trio slept without being disturbed, and they awoke with the sun.

“I want to see it,” Nuji stated to the men as the forest began to brighten. “I want to see the city. I’ve been thinking a lot about the trees attacking those soldiers, and I’ve got an idea about what happened.” She did not tell the men that her thoughts were dark.

Even though Othri’s pain the night before caused him to forget talking to Nuji, he did remember sneaking to the edge of Vuliburge and what he saw. “It’s been obliterated,” he informed her. He went on to explain the devastation and how the inhabitants were being held in an internment camp.

Nuji was determined. “Everything you’ve told me makes me want to see the city even more. Tigath, Othri, do you want to wait here or come with me?”

“I think we should stay here,” Tigath replied.

Othri began to protest, but as he tried to stand, a wave of pain forced him to stagger against a tree. “Yeah,” he agreed, “maybe we’ll just wait here. May I please have another sip of your whisperoot tea?”

Nuji nodded. “I’ll leave it with you, and I’ll be back.”

She handed the flask to Othri, left the two green men behind, and made her way through the trees. After almost twenty minutes of hiking, she found an elevated location above Vuliburge. Nuji was horrified by what she saw.

The earliest Noktar, Rothians, and Urcai developed their technology in a way that amplified the natural world. Their structures utilized and focused the energies of the forest, while also collecting water and nutrients that were redistributed to dryer regions. The plants and the structures grew as one, and the city had actively made the forest more vibrant. Now Vuliburge looked like a spot of plague, a disease that marred the land.

The catastrophic loss of life helped solidify the calculations that had come to Nuji in the darkness the night before. The entire city of Vuliburge was laid to waste, and its population was decimated. The thriving metropolis had been home to over one-million inhabitants, and Nuji could not guess how few were left, but she knew most of the city now lay dead. Whatever fraction of the free peoples remained, it was tiny.

Tears filled her eyes for the mass death, and she whispered to herself, “The Humans have to be stopped.”

She turned to look back toward where Tigath and Othri were waiting. Her thoughts spun like the colors in a kaleidoscope, and she remembered a wonder that had always intrigued her as a child, the vast Grimoire Library of the faraway Yellow City. Nuji had never gotten an opportunity to visit before her banishment, but she had very much wanted to bask in its glory.

“Maybe there are scholars at the Library who are educated about ancient magicks and can help those lads,” Nuji said to herself. She added, “Magic trees, how peculiar. Is that what I felt, a wave of magic from the trees?” Nuji knew it would be a long journey to the Grimoire Library, but with Othri now on the mend, she was confident he and Tigath would make it. “Those two lads need to go to the Yellow City.”