I was reckless, but I wasn’t stupid. I brought two friends from the temple with me; Gavin, a warrior; and Aislin, a healer. We were all armed, though Finn only carried a dagger and likely didn’t intend on using it.
The Gate was hidden away in a cave beneath the council’s stronghold; they probably built their precious hovel on top of it to watch over it. It only had a single guard, easily dispatched with a knock to the head. We stuffed her in a bush and crept inside.
A winding tunnel supported by pillars of alien metal led us directly to the Gate. The Gate’s chamber was timeless in an antediluvian way, something eldritch and unknowable. The metal that composed the walls, floor, and ceiling looked like tourmaline or the inside of a geode, rainbow-hued and glossy. It was shot through with channels of deep obsidian that seemed to suck in the light emitted by cubes raised out of the floor.
The Gate itself was an archway of translucent crystal. Six people could have comfortably walked through it side by side, and I imagined imperial legions – or what imperial legions might have looked like – using this Gate to journey to a dozen different worlds.
There was a raised platform in the center of the room and I stepped up onto it. I could feel the potential in the air, the weight of history, the power locked away in strange crystal and otherworldly devices. A thousand years ago, or maybe longer, the Ancients built the Gates for us to find. They were pathways between worlds, twisting trails across the cosmos.
The fallen empire had used the Gates, once. Then the Gates broke, and the empire fell. Now, the prophecy warned of our enemies using these same Gates to destroy us. The council wouldn’t listen to me, so I had to show them; I had to open the Gate within the mountain and prove once and for all that they could bring about our downfall.
The others wandered the chamber, marveling at its strangeness, though Finn kept glancing around nervously. I’d explained to them my reasoning and they’d agreed, at least enough to join me. Opening the Gate was risky, but if it furthered the prophecy then it was worth the risk. I needed to be named the island’s protector, and I needed the temple to give me undivided support as the chosen one.
A lone voice in my head dissented. I did my best to ignore that voice and focus on my task.
Aislin turned to me and asked, “So what’s the plan, boss? Got some mystical key hidden away? Got the inside scoop on how Ancient tech works?”
I shrugged. “Actually, I was thinking of just blasting it with lightning.” Then I blasted it with lightning.
Red light arced from my hands to the Gate, and crackled along the crystal archway’s length. I fed the crimson lightning with my fury at Morgan’s betrayal and let out a feral snarl.
This is my destiny. I threw all my hate and frustration at the Ancient structure and watched the lightning break apart into more and more arcs of light, until the whole Gate was covered in crackling red.
My arms started to ache, and a wave of tiredness washed over me. Using this much sorcery was putting a strain on my system, and I was out of practice. My anger started to dwindle, and other emotions came rushing in: fear, guilt, and doubt.
What was going to happen if I failed to prove myself? How could I lash out at that innocent guard? Was I strong enough to save us?
My legs grew heavy, and I wavered. It wasn’t working. The Gate wasn’t changing. Of course it wasn’t changing. Had I really thought I could succeed where the empire had failed? Had I been so arrogant to presume I could cut the knot where others had tried to untangle it?
Sweat matted my hair. My vision blurred at the edges, until all I could see was the Gate. I needed this. I wanted this. It was mine by right. The council had denied me. Morgan had denied me. Now this Gate, this hunk of glass, would deny me too?
No.
My name is Gwyn, and I am the chosen one.
I would not tolerate this final defiance. This arch of crystal would not best the hero of prophecy. I pushed with my magic, poured more effort into it, found more depth to my well of fury and channeled it all into thrusting my will at this antiquated portal.
The crystal began to glow red.
I pushed with the last of my energy and watched as all the lightning I’d summoned, all the concentrated agony energy, flowed into the Gate and lit it from the inside. The Gate was infused with my power, and it pulsed in time with my heartbeat. It was mine.
Finn, Gavin, and Aislin stared at the Gate in shock, and then a hologram materialized in front of me.
Two dozen shards of colorful rock orbited an orange-red ball of fire. The image was bright, but I could just barely see my allies through the shards and fiery orb. I tentatively waved my hand and it passed cleanly through the rocks. I touched the fire and it radiated no heat.
One of the shards looked familiar, and I frowned. No hand gesture changed the image, but if the Gate reacted to sorcery, perhaps a similar principle applied here? I took a deep breath and reached out with my will, urging the hologram to enlarge the shard I was focused on.
The image obeyed, and the other shards fell away. There was only the shard I’d focused on, and the ball of fire it was orbiting. The shard was blue, with patches of brown and gray and a single large patch of green. I willed the image to come even closer, and I began to make out more detail. I saw the edges of the world where the land fell away and the waters grew stagnant. I saw the seas and islands.
It was my world. My sea. My island.
Two strange runes appeared and started flickering, changing shape erratically. One was displayed over the mountain I was standing inside, and the other was displayed in the center of the shard over a tiny patch of gray. The mountain rune was glowing, and the distant rune was dim. I couldn’t read the runes, but the intent seemed obvious: they displayed Gate locations.
Finn whistled appreciatively. “You did it. You actually did it.”
I shook my head. “Not yet.”
I directed my will at the hologram again and returned to the view of the shards, and what I assumed to be the sun. I picked a predominantly-white shard and focused on it. The hologram showed me a shard covered in white and grey, with blotches of bright red. It was more mountainous than my home, and I didn’t see a single body of blue large enough to be a sea.
Two more runes flickered into existence, both dim. I picked one at random and willed it to activate. The rune glowed, and the hologram vanished. The Gate pulsed.
In the space within the archway, reality was torn asunder. Blinding red light coalesced into a sheer wall, and then that wall of light began to ripple with a liquid intensity. The portal shimmered, and beckoned.
The Gate was open.
Little specks of white fell through the portal and drifted gently into the chamber. The room felt a little colder, and a chill breeze brushed against my skin.
Gavin lifted his hands and caught a few specks. His eyes widened and he exclaimed, “Water! They’re like little flakes of water, but cold.”
Aislin frowned. “Is that whole world covered in frozen water? How could anything survive?”
“Maybe they live in the red areas?”
“Yeah, but what are those? They could be lakes of fire or something.”
“Or red grass.”
The two of them bickered over geology and biospheres, and I walked up to the Gate. It was magnificent. The cold was stronger the closer I moved. The wall of light was a silk curtain just waiting to be pushed aside, practically begging me to step through and into an alien world. It tempted me with visions of imperial legions and court warlocks striding through. Fallen nobility stepping onto foreign soil. This world might even have been one the empire conquered. A birthright waiting to be claimed. It sang to me with howling wind, a harsh melody becoming louder the closer I ventured.
I raised my hand to touch the light and pass through, but something in the air changed. A disturbance like someone was blocking a doorway. The portal started to ripple.
I took a few steps back and grabbed the hilt of my blade, ready to unsheath it if necessary. My allies noticed my behavior and went for their own weapons. Anticipation turned a few seconds into a silver of infinity.
Something came through.
It was a tremendous beast with ram’s horns and blue-white fur. It walked like kindred, but with a hunched back and the occasional dragged knuckle. Its eyes were baleful black dots, and it emitted a low growl as it examined each of us in turn. Its arms were thick as barrels and ended in meaty fists.
None of us moved. Aislin whispered to me, “What do we do?” from her place at my side. The two of us were standing just in front of the dais, closest to the monster. Gavin was off to the side a bit, and Finn was behind us.
I ran the odds in my head. I hadn’t expected a fight, but I’d prepared for one, and the three of us were dangerous. We could take on even numbers with ease, and we’d even won against superior forces. But a lumbering beast with curling horns?
The monster took another step closer. I threw out planning and trusted my instincts; I threw lightning.
It roared in fury as red agony surged into it, but then everything went fuzzy and when my vision cleared I was in Aislin’s arms and everything hurt. Too much magic. Too much strain.
The monster unleashed a roar of pain that dwarfed my pathetic groan. I pushed Aislin away and drew my blade, waving it front of me wildly while shouting to my allies, “Don’t worry about me, just kill this thing!”
The creature stayed back from my attacks while the others repositioned. Gavin came in beside me with spear and shield, while Aislin drew back to ready her bow. I nodded to Gavin, and we moved as a unit.
Gavin approached from the flank while I faced the creature head-on. The beast took a step back each time we took a step forward, and we steadily pushed it back. The feral look in its eyes turned wary, then trapped as it realized it was outmatched.
An arrow from Aislin bounced off one of its horns and the beast roared again. This time, the roar was weaker, afraid. I grinned and moved in for the kill.
A familiar voice shouted, “What is the meaning of this?!” from behind me. Instinctively I turned to look, and in that moment the beast lashed out. Gavin and I both went skidding across the metallic floor.
The monster dashed for the portal, evaded another of Aislin’s arrows, and vanished.
I turned on the intruders ready to furiously chastise them for costing me victory, but the accusation died in my throat when I saw the Councilors standing there.
Councilor Ibis had been the one to yell. As I stood there with gaping mouth she marched briskly over to Gavin and knelt by him, performing a cursory examination and checking his vitals.
Capra and Lupa focused on the Gate and slowly walked over to look at it, though both stayed a safe distance away. Lupa whistled.
“Impressive work, kid. How did you pull it off?”
I blinked a few times, registered the question, and managed to say, “Lightning.”
“Ah. The same lightning as you employed on an innocent guard earlier today?”
I shrank in on myself a little, which was all the answer she needed. She waved a hand dismissively.
“No lasting harm, no reason to worry. I think it’s safe to say that this discovery of yours eclipses everything else.”
Ibis rose and scoffed. “Are you still taking her side? She just opened the Gate! How can you show her even a shred of sympathy after that? She has ruined centuries of stability with a single action.”
I could barely believe what I was hearing. I moved between them and pointed off to the side at Capra. “He asked about the threat. You lot said the Gates didn’t work, so there was nothing to worry about.” I spread my arms wide at the glowing portal. “The Gate works. The threat is real. I am the chosen one. Now is the time to act.”
“You have endangered us all!”
“I-”
Ibis cut me off before I could defend myself. “Yes, endangered! Either you reactivated the Gates and gave this threat of yours the method it needed to invade, or the Gates were working the whole time and you just informed all our enemies where we are and how to get to us. This was beyond reckless.
“I thought your proposal was unneeded, but even I thought Vesta was going too far when she called you a narcissist. Now? There is no question that you are driven by a vainglorious lust for power and praise. Opening that Gate was an act of destructive, self-indulgent narcissism the likes of which our people have not seen since the days of the fallen empire.”
The councilor’s speech hung in the air, and the only sound was the humming of the Gate. Everyone was crowded around me now, looking at me. Judging me. Haunting me.
Capra broke the silence with a cough and said, “I’m afraid I agree. The temple’s ideology has engendered in Gwyneth a dangerous zealotry. My apologies, Ibis, for dismissing your concerns earlier.”
Ibis nodded graciously. “We must act decisively and show our people that glory hounds and blood knights will not be celebrated, but punished. I move we determine the girl’s fate immediately, and vote in favor of exile.”
Terror swallowed my rage. Exile? Leaving everything behind? No. No, that wasn’t possible. I-
Lupa threw up her hands and protested, “This is ludicrous! She was reckless, but if you have a problem with her ideology then we should be targeting the temple, not her. She could be useful, Capra. This was not an act of malice, and we should not throw away resources just as we learn about a threat to our world.”
Capra shook his head. “The temple shall be dealt with later. Gwyn is too dangerous, too volatile.”
“I- I’m standing right here,” I mumbled.
“I cast my vote in favor of exile.”
Lupa made a little sound of frustration and stormed off.
Ibis said, “Lupa has chosen not to vote. Gwyneth of the temple, you are now an exile. You may bring supplies necessary for survival, and a boat if one is offered to you. Anyone who seeks to join you will also be labeled an exile, and never allowed to return here. If you attempt to remain on the island, you will be removed by force. Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be, child.”
Then she was gone, and Capra was gone, and I was alone and afraid.
I was an exile.