Another Rider, Another Storm

The Silvergrey Sea

Part Six: Storms

Another Rider, Another Storm

* * *

Looking at the towering waves only kept from swamping the island by the powerful magicks of his fellows, the White Elect could not decide who had the least desirable duty: he who must guide the dragons back to Azhure’en or the Kokkinos who had to stay and direct efforts to calm the Sea and prevent another attempt to recreate the Templars.

The roaring and crashing of stuff of the Sea was as frightening an experience as he’d ever had. For the first time since the Order of Hermes began keeping records, there were unpredictable winds, as well. Gale force blasts, also halted by the shield, buffeted the barrier creating drum-like pounding. The energy conferred to the Silvergrey by the bits of crystalline Life looked to threaten its very existence. The force of the storm continued to increase at a steady rate. Only a finite amount of energy could be directed to the shield. If nothing changed, it would be overwhelmed.

No way had been discovered to stop it. Efforts to pull the stuff out of the Sea had proved futile so far, though a squad of Hermetists continued to try. The Albedo was pessimistic about their chances of success.

The White Elect’s task meant he could leave at least, but he had to traverse this eldritch hurricane to get to the Mother Lodge. The dragons themselves would provide protection of a sort. Whether it would prove enough was another unknown that knotted his stomach.

Delay was not an option.

Standing apart from the others, he hailed the drakes with the special whistle they responded to. In moments, he was the focus of a vortex of stone-made, flapping wings. Gracefully, they settled in rings around him, as he became the focus of many pairs of deep blue, intelligent eyes. To his relief, the number of dragons killed or severely injured seemed to have been minimal.

The Albedo approached the nearest one, who moved its wings up and forward and stretched out its neck. Gingerly, he mounted it. He had last flown one of these in the days before his final initiation. It was a thrilling and frightening experience. He expected the latter to be the predominant emotion today.

He was almost immediately comforted. The creature may have been made of stone, but it gave under his thighs like warm flesh. Its wings settled and it rose on its haunches, the nape of its neck molding to him and making his seat seem more secure.

Another, different tune, and the beast led the rage as they rose above the crowd. His stomach seemed to stay where it was. He gripped the ridge along the creature’s spine a bit more tightly than he’d planned. Consciously, he relaxed it as the smooth ride he remembered took him in a large arc out toward the Sea.

By focussing his attention, the White Elect could see the top of the mystic barrier erected to keep the encampment of Hermetists safe. He knew the dragons could see it, too.

To distract himself, he thought of all the Hermetists knew about the creatures.

It wasn’t much. They had come with the Mother Lodge itself as a gift from the Templars in the days after the capture of the White God, just before the last two alive, the siblings Phaeton and Paris, had performed their final act of protection against a return of the menace that had destroyed the Shining Empire.

Beside the obvious—that the drakes were a last line of defense against the release of the White God—the only thing the last Templars had said was that the dragons were Aer Elementals who had agreed, by contract, to take on that duty.

The Albedo had always been slightly unsettled by that. If the dragons were volunteers rather than conscripts, they could decide to leave. Though not a fan of coercion, he was not sanguine about leaving a critical role to be abandoned at the whim of creatures whose way of thinking was so alien to his own. The beast under him seemed to sense his worry. A feeling very much like reassurance filled his mind coming, no doubt, from the drake. Despite himself, the White Elect was reassured. Obviously, having kept the duty for so many thousands of years, the dragons must take it seriously, indeed.

The wind hit the rage a few seconds before they passed through the barrier. The Albedo was shielded from the buffeting by an aura the dragon projected. The creature itself was not. Their forward progress was almost completely arrested. The rate of flapping increased, while its amplitude decreased sharply. The rage, led by his steed, wheeled to the left, passing along the undulating shield of magick.

They were riding the storm.

In seconds, they were out over the Silvergrey Sea. The island and the entirety of the Evanescents were lost to sight a few minutes later. The Albedo had no idea where he was. The drakes were reputed to have unerring directional skills. They knew where home was and would get there if the storm permitted. He had to rely on that and wasn’t happy about it.

The dragons of Azhure’en were not made things but had been bred for the defense of the mountain city that was now the home of the Order of Hermes. Little else was known about their origin, except a fragment of knowledge uncovered by the Hermetists living in the decades after the end of the Pleroma suggesting they might have been fæ before agreeing to be altered by the Templars. This seemed unlikely, as there were no fæ before the emergence of the Templars and the use of any of their children was not something the Templars would have liked to do. The former masters of the Shining Empire had been strongly defensive of their offspring.

Every time the White Elect thought of this, his mind went to the Aion lost to the Elven Convocation—called by them the Dark. The only creatures resembling dragons the Order knew of were residents of that corrupt dimension. Again, it seemed unlikely the Templars would employ such creatures, even had they existed before the Templar’s rise, but a nagging doubt continued assailing him. Some inconsistency nagged.

He lost track of how long the journey lasted. There was no way to gauge their progress. The huge waves were most often travelling the same way they were, since fighting them meant fighting the wind head-on and seemed too tough a task for the beasts to undertake for long. The Albedo occasionally caught glimpses of what might have been ships. They were always out of the corner of his eye and in the distance. He hadn’t considered the fate of shipboard Hermetists when this tempest struck and did not think any of their vessels could withstand such violence. The White Elect hoped they had managed to make a safe port before things got too rough.

The dragons were highly intelligent and had been known to communicate directly with the minds of some of the Order. They had an almost instinctual relationship with the Silvergrey Sea, seeming to draw not only comfort, but also sustenance from it. They were the best natural navigators the Order knew of. The Albedo thought the Evanescents might have been the place of their rebirth as Elements.

The Albedo had half expected the storm to peter out the farther they got from the point where the Primal Matter had entered the Sea. After several hours, he began to realize the magnitude of the disaster the Hermetists had unleashed.

Then he saw the ship.

It was a Hermetist brigantine and it was in obvious trouble. The White Elect was duty bound to do something. He whistled a command. Turning almost ninety degrees, the rage fought the crosswind and headed for the stricken ship. As they neared, it he saw the situation was very dire.

She was missing her masts; part of the port hull was stove in, probably because a mast had crashed through it, and it was listing dangerously close to the liquid of the Silvergrey. He could see a few supine figures on the decks and two who appeared to be standing. They spotted the drakes and began waving. One moved to the stern deck and bent to one of the figures slumped over the wheel. The Albedo’s urgency communicated itself to his steed and the whole rage began descending toward the stricken ship. The figure on the wheel began to move.

The speed and grace of their descent was encouraging to the White Elect. It felt almost as if they genuinely were concerned for the Hermetists, which they may well have been.

The Albedo had no notion of what the dragons really thought of their lot. When not in active service, they patrolled the roofs of the Mother Lodge in their creepily unmoving way. Occasionally though, some vanished for shorter or longer periods. No one knew why or to where they went, or even if they had gone anywhere; they could simply have become insensible.

He suspected they had congresses of sorts. The White Elect would have given much to know what they discussed, were this so. It was comforting to think they cared enough about their charges that they would discuss the proper care of them.

The waves on the Sea were inspiring and terrifying in their magnitude and power. The wave crests were a mile apart and at least two hundred yards in height. Defined only by blinding reflections of light, flying over this Sea was unsettlingly surreal. As the rage dove toward the stricken ship, the speed the waves were travelling became apparent as well. It was going to be a difficult rescue. The wind was much less in the troughs but kicked up a spray of deadly liquid. The dragon shielded its charge from it, but the mariners below had no such protection. He suspected many of those who were down had been poisoned by the lethal liquid of the Sea.

The habitual light of the Sea reflected off much larger surfaces, now. The wave crest to the left was a blinding panel of light. It got worse the closer the dragons got to the boat. The Albedo whistled the dragons to swing close to the rapidly approaching wave, putting the light behind them. It was barely half a mile behind and closing fast. It rose more steeply than he’d hoped it would. The damage to the craft must have come from previous waves. He doubted it could survive another. A quick calculation told the Albedo they had two minutes, no more before the boat would be swamped and capsized.

Their target was brilliantly lit, making the task marginally easier. Only a hundred yards out, now.

At first, he didn’t think what happened next was anything other than the Sea’s fury.

The boat rose on a pillow of Sea stuff. Another pillar of it began to rise to the ship’s starboard. A moment of terrifying recognition: Poseidon.

Obviously pissed that his plan had been thwarted, the Sea God was having a bit of a tantrum. The White Elect later wondered how many ships that never made port again it had destroyed.

Fear became anger.

Needing no command, the rage increased their speed, wings driving them to much greater than wind speed.

Not enough.

The Albedo watched in impotent rage and pain as Poseidon picked up the ship and crushed it as if it were made of damp paper.

As one, the dragons roared, something he had never heard of them doing before. Brilliant blue-white light belched from their snouts, another first to his knowledge.

They blew the body of the Sea God to steam.

The Albedo was too distraught and shocked to react. Fortunately, his companions were wiser. Without prompting, they rose and arced away from the sad wreck of the vessel, clearing the area before Poseidon could recover.

The rest of the trip was spent in tears for lost brethren.

* * *

The White Elect admitted had to admit to feeling more than a little apprehensive as to what he’d find at the Mother Lodge. The wrath of the Sea God had shaken him. There was a large part of the Sea under the very foundations of Azhure’en. Glyph might well be similarly imperilled because of the Styx.

He saw the mist of transition hovering above the Sea even through the wind and monstrous waves. The rage of dragons was upon it and through faster than the Albedo had ever experienced.

The sudden quiet was deafening.

The worst of his fears seemed unfounded. The Sea of the ports, though rougher than he had ever seen, was almost calm compared to the fury without. The Elect led the rage around to the largest exit. His steed alighted on the quay. Once he had dismounted, it joined its own and flew away to its place on the roofs—or so he thought.

The Albedo saw a scattering of ships in this lobe of the harbour. Slightly more than usual, but nowhere near the whole fleet. Swells—small to be sure but never before seen here—disturbed the calm of the waves.

“Sir?” the polite inquiry behind him.

The Elect turned to see a young Hermetist he did not recognize. Her oval face was just touched by a smile.

“I’m relieved to see you, sir. Do you know where the Kokkinos and the Mercurius are? Are they on their way?”

“Both are engaged elsewhere. Don’t expect to see them before this crisis is over.” He decided not to enlighten her about the change in the leadership of the Order. ‘Sufficient unto the day, the evil thereof,’ as the saying went.

“What is—” A boom echoed around the cavernous space. The Hermetists both turned to it.

A mound of the Sea rose and shuddered very near one of the ships. It changed shape, seemed to be struggling. The Elect thought he recognized the Sea God before it collapsed back beneath the surface. Ships rocked, as the wave of its presence spread. The vessel that had been closest, slamming against a pier repeatedly.

“That’s been happening for the last few hours. Something is trying to break through.”

The Albedo turned to her. “Poseidon.”

Her eyes widened, mouth opening several times before, “What? Why?”

“There’s much to discuss. Summon all Hermetists in residence. Actually, all Hermetists who can safely make it to Mother Lodge.” He strode through the nearest exit, the other skipping to try to keep up.

“There’s another problem here, sir.”

“What?” the White Elect asked over his shoulder as the pair moved down the plain pointed vaulted corridor.

“Better if you see it yourself, sir.”

“Where?”

“The Mercurius’s lodgings, sir.”

They took a spiralling escalator to the crossing. Light through the windows was not just orange, anymore. Flickers of silver-white, always near the crossing itself, joined them. That boded nothing good. “Come on, hurry.”

The trip to the peak of the mountain city seemed to take forever. The Albedo was near convinced that not even this place was proof against the Sea God’s wrath, despite what he’d seen below.

The ‘problem’ did little to assuage that fear. Standing on a balcony high in the spire the Elect saw the source of the flickering light. A ragged edged hole was opening in the sky directly above—a Portal, had to be. He could just make out where it opened.

The Silvergrey Sea. He was just trying to wrap his mind around this when with another unprecedented roar, the dragons began flying upward and through it.

—Gideon Jagged
Innsmouth, October 2026

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