Leaving his sword by his bedroll, but taking his component pouch, he strolled around the camp. In doing so, he heard with his own ears what Tamharu had been reporting. Everybody had their own story.

“... entire ‘ousehold killed,” he heard a grizzled old man say. “Terrible stuff, I tell you. Completely ‘orrible. I saw with my own eyes. ‘Eads ripped off. Blood everywhere.”

But there seemed to be plenty of skeptics, too.

“There’s nothing nefarious going on at all. It’s the wainwrights, I tell you. Wagons are selling out everywhere. They’re spreading rumors to make money, that’s all.”

“Them and the shipwrights.”

“Maybe, but better safe than sorry, eh?”

“True. And that’s why I’m ‘eading out for business now instead of next month.”

After circling around the camp, he heard at least six different rumors about what was happening. Back at the convoy, he found Gandash laying on his back on his bedroll, staring up at the stars.

Xerxes sat on his own bedroll.

“They’re gone,” Gandash said.

Xerxes looked over. “What was that?”

“There’s no more meteors,” Gandash said. “Not a single one.”

Xerxes stared up into the sky. “Is that so? I haven’t been looking.”

He lay down, put his hands behind his head, and gazed at the glittering tableau.

“I’ve been watching,” Gandash continued. “There haven’t been any.”

“I suppose that’s a good thing.”

They lay there in silence for a few minutes.

“Gandy?”

“Yeah?”

Xerxes opened his mouth to talk, but suddenly his throat tightened, and his chest grew heavy. “I….”

“We’re…” Gandash began, then coughed a bit. “We’re going to pull through this.”

Xerxes exhaled slowly. “I know. I just want to go home.”

“Me too.”

As they neared the capital, the upsurge in travelers turned into an outright stream, and then a flood.

Soon enough, the rumors began to solidify. People had been killed in the capital, and everyone was scared. The Mage Parliament had made announcements and proclamations asking for calm, but they only seemed to have the opposite effect.

On the night before their final day of travel, they finally heard the talk they had all been expecting to hear, yet hoping not to.

Monsters had been spotted in the city. Again, there were no specific details. But there was no question about it. The Mage Parliament had ordered a curfew and a lockdown. Soldiers patrolled the streets. Mages had been seen out and about, asking questions, and investigating places where ‘incidents’ had occurred.

Xerxes had a hard time reading the mood of the soldiers. They seemed pensive, but at the same time, eager to be off the road.

On the final day, Captain Ishki pressed them to move as quickly as possible on the crowded roads. On more than one occasion, traffic jams forced them to halt. A cart overturned. An injured pack animal. An altercation between traveling parties.

Captain Ishki never hesitated to wade in, bark orders, and get people moving again.

Instead of stopping for dinner, they ate while moving, and by the time the city walls came into view, it was already early evening.

Captain Ishki had made it clear that they were going to stay together as a convoy until they reached the keep. Of the surviving soldiers, the majority were Isinian, and virtually all of them had friends and family in the city. But the captain said their priority was to report to the Parliament, not only to explain what happened on the mission, but also to see what new orders might be pending given the circumstances. All Xerxes knew was that he couldn’t wait to get back. To the familiar streets. The hustle and bustle of city life. To home.

When they arrived at the gates, there was no line going inside. There were still guards present, but all of them were preoccupied with facilitating an orderly exit rather than the normal measures taken to monitor entry. By-the-book Captain Ishki had all the papers, insignias, and other items ready before they approached the gate. All it took was a strongly-worded order to get a guard to tend to them. The formalities were handled quickly. Almost too quickly if the captain’s muttered curses were any indication of her assessment of the guards’ attention to detail. Regardless, they were in the city proper within minutes.

As soon as they were making their way through the streets, Xerxes’ previous anticipation turned sour. Everything felt wrong. The capital was supposed to be a bustling, crowded place filled with a mishmash of unique sounds and sights. But right now, everything seemed depressingly empty and quiet.

There were still people present and shops were open. But customers and pedestrians all seemed to be in a hurry to get somewhere else, and those with nowhere to go looked around with hooded eyes and pursed lips.

“Damn,” Gandash said quietly. “This is weird.”

“You’re telling me,” Xerxes replied.

They made their way through familiar streets until they were at the keep in the center of the city.

The Mage Parliament didn’t have a physical location that served as a permanent headquarters. It rotated between the capital cities of the three major kingdoms on a triennial basis. For the past two years, that headquarters had been here in Isin.

There were more formalities at the entrance to the keep. Once inside the main gate, the wagon with the illegal machinery was taken to a warehouse set aside for Parliamentary use. The privates—two from Squad One, three from Squad Two, and five from Squad Three—were dismissed for the time being.

That left Captain Ishki, Sergeants Tamharu and Aniskipel, and Xerxes and Gandash. Word had been left at the gate for them to immediately head to the main council chamber upon their return. There was no need for an escort, as Captain Ishki knew the way. She led them through the keep at a near trot.

Minutes later, they entered the chamber, which had a vaulted ceiling and an oblong table in the middle, laden with a plethora of books, scrolls, maps, and the like. Open windows let in outside air and light, and there were even doors leading out to what was surely a balcony, though they were closed. There were also lamps providing light.

Seven pairs of eyes turned in their direction as they entered.

Xerxes’ heart leapt into his throat. His father, Ataneedusu, stood among the gathered mages. He wanted to run over and throw himself into his father’s arms, but he held back, instead struggling to mask a grin as he nodded. His father nodded back. Many said that Xerxes resembled his father; they had the same eyes, the same smile, and the same prominent nose. The main difference was his father’s spectacularly styled beard. Xerxes’ still didn’t have sufficient facial hair for anything so impressive.

Standing next to Xerxes’ father was Gandash’s father, Dumamu. His beard was similarly styled to Ataneedusu’s, except it had small jewels braided into it. What was more, Dumamu wore a robe of much finer cloth, and had numerous bits of jewelry elsewhere on him. The difference between him and Xerxes’ father was obvious to anyone with eyes.

Also present at the table was Mystic Aban Saddi, who was the Head Mage and also the strongest master of arcane arts on the planet. His well-oiled mustache was unusual for a man of Isin, but rumor had it his mother was a foreigner. He wore robes as fine as Dumamu’s, but instead of the characteristic white, cylindrical hat worn by most mages, he wore a turban of blue cloth. Aban Saddi was one of the only other Buhhu mages on Mannemid, and had tutored Gandash on more than one occasion.

High Seers Ninsunu and Shemesh were present.

Ninsunu, whose name had so recently been mentioned in stories while traveling, studied the Sinitu order, which made her capable of physical transformations, both of herself and others. She was over a hundred and twenty years old, but looked middle-aged. She had dark hair and an aquiline nose, and wore adornments of gold and silver that made her look almost like a noble.

Shemesh specialized in the order of Hasasu, with spells that made him capable of sensing the thoughts and feelings of others, and also giving him the ability to read omens in the stars. This was the same order of magic that Gandash’s father studied, although Dumamu was an ordinary Seer, not a High Seer.

Also present was Alwin, who was only a few years older than Gandash and Xerxes. He studied the Nasaru order, that of defense and protection. As one of the newer Seers, he had originally been assigned to go on the mission to Ligish Castle, but had fallen ill at the last minute, and was replaced by Bel. It only now occurred to Xerxes that, if Alwin hadn’t gotten sick, Bel might still be alive. He swallowed the bitterness that rose up in his heart when he considered that.

The King Nabuhisnu’isin of Isin was present, an old man of noble character who was well-loved by the people, and generally respected by the mages.

As the surviving officers and mages of the convoy entered the council chamber, it was obvious they’d interrupted a heated conversation.

Everyone present went quiet, then Mystic Aban Saddi cleared his throat.

“Captain Ishki, your timing couldn’t have been better,” he said. “Or worse.”

Note: At this point, all of the major paths of magic have been introduced, some of them in passing. Going forward, I will do my best to make sure their general function is made even more clear. Also, I'm working on a wiki to gather some of this info for easy reference. In the meantime, here is a brief summary of the orders of magic that have been described up to this point:

Nasaru - Defense/Shielding

Asgagu - Combat/Destruction

Balatu - Healing

Sinitu - Transformation/Transumation

Hasasu - Mind Reading/Divination

Buhhu - Summoning