Jonis by Rowan Erlking (free children's online books txt) 📖

the argument, setting another grave on fire.

“It is considered treasonous talk,” Lt. Gillway said in a dangerous voice, approaching Cpl. Higges. “The Patriarch watches over our country.”

Cpl. Higges just shrugged, pretending to not be affronted by his commanding officer’s accusation. “I’m just talking. It’s not anything we haven’t heard before.”

“Just shut up,” Lt. Gillway said, passing him. He glanced once at Jonis. He knew how much the young Cordril admired Mr. Farren much as he would a father.

They went back to work, setting everything inside Jonis’s fire ward ablaze. The hilltop burned well that night.

 

The following village also had worm problems. Yet again, that too had been handled by a skilled magister. He, however, took care of the worms in a different manner.

The village patriarch led the troop of six through the outskirts through the main road into the village square to meet the magister, somewhat smug in his stride. Jonis looked around at the wooden buildings and all the anti-demon spells around it. In fact, there had been a ring of black stones that had encircled the village in what used to be a demon ward. The road had torn up parts of it so it was no longer effective. Inside the village square was where the magister sat, ringed with another demon ward on the crushed gravel. He was sitting in a serene cross-legged position, meditating.

“Magister Grobis,” the patriarch said with a slightly haughty tone to his voice. “The military demon hunters are here. Don’t you think you had better come out and greet them?”

The magister merely opened his eyes. Jonis guessed the man to be in his late eighties. His wrinkles sagged from his hollow cheeks as if once his jaw had been a strong one. A lean man, the magister hunched over slightly, making him also appear somewhat frail. Still, he had a sword at his side that was as large as Sisrik’s, along with a set of wooden stakes in a crossbow. The sword looked Kitai in origin.

“Are you here to take my job?” the magister asked in an ancient gravelly voice.

Lt. Gillway put on his best smile, propping his hands against his hips. “No, sir. But the patriarch here is concerned about your methods. He says you are taking too long.”

The magister let his eyes fall on each one of the soldiers before speaking. Of course they stopped on Jonis longer than the rest. “My methods prove right. He will get what he paid for.”

Jonis blinked, wondering at how he had phrased that. He will get what he paid for sounded rather loaded.

“And how much did he pay?” escaped Cpl. Higges’s lips, thinking along the same vein.

The magister smiled broader. “A modest extermination fee.”

“Fifty-five gold pieces per worm dead,” the patriarch said with a bite to his voice.

The soldiers raised their eyebrows.

“That’s half a much as the other magister charged the last village,” Lt. Pratch said aloud.

Jonis nodded. “In magisterial terms, that is a bargain.”

“Yes,” the magister murmured, looking straight at Jonis. He stood up. At his full height, the man did not seem so frail. In fact, he looked like he had once been a formidable warrior, long since grown old. His muscle still clung to him. His red uniform was patched, and it also had many leather adornments added to it for rough and tumble fighting. He did not leave his circle.

Turning and looking around himself at the village square, then the villagers along the side of the road watching them, Lt. Gillway said, “So, what has the magister done about the demon worms?”

The village patriarch huffed. “The man had them all confined into a demon circle in that house over there. He is now waiting for them to die. That’s all.”

Waving over to him, the lieutenant asked with a great amount of puzzlement, “Then why is he waiting here? Is he planning on an attack? Or is he waiting to burn the place down?”

“I don’t know,” the patriarch said scowling. “He told us never to go into that house again once they were dead. He said nothing about a fire. We paid him. He is free to go.”

Jonis turned on his heel toward the house indicated. “Ok, then, we can burn it down. Those demon eggs must be incinerated.”

“Don’t interfere, Cordril,” the magister said, still glaring. “Let the dead be. That is the natural order of things.”

“I told you all magisters are crooked,” Cpl. Higges leaned over and hissed in Jonis’s ear. “He just wants a chance for future profit, like that last one.”

The light in the magister’s eyes flared, turning on Cpl. Higges. “Don’t consort with demons, soldier. You may come up as one.”

Jonis turned an about face and blinked at the man. There was something familiar in how he had said that. “Do I know you?”

The magister laughed, drawing his sword. “I doubt it. I have met many a demon, but they always are dead after the fact.”

These words also echoed in Jonis’s memory. He had heard them several times before in fact, but not as Jonis Macoy. Jonis took a step away from the man.

“Ah, the demon boy actually does recognize me somehow,” the magister said with one large step out of his demon ward. He hefted up his sword as if it were light. “I had heard a Cordril traveled with an army group. I stayed to see you for myself.”

This man’s voice was extremely familiar, though Jonis did not recall it sounding so old in his memory. Jonis took another step back. “And what do you intend to do, now that you have met me?”

The magister nodded to the patriarch and said to Jonis, “I have one question to ask you.”

Jonis kept his distance, placing his hand on his own sword hilt. “What’s that?”

“Are you the surviving child of Talib Macoy and Pelina Havers?”

Shuddering, Jonis drew his blade. “Who wants to know?”

Lt. Gillway’s eyes grew wide watching Jonis move back. The boy set his feet for a fight.

The lieutenant stepped in between them. “It doesn’t matter! Private Macoy is a soldier in the Brein Amon army. You cannot kill him without the repercussions falling on your head. It would be murder.”

But the lieutenant acted alone in protest. The other officers hopped to the side, either giving the hunter permission, or more likely not desiring to set themselves between a hunter and his prey.

Jonis remained on the defensive.

Lifting his chin, the magister took a piece of old oil-paper out of his pocket, waving it at Lt. Gillway. “Not if there is an outstanding warrant for his arrest. He and his father are refugees from the village of Pringsley for the murder of Gale Havers and this boy’s mother, Pelina.”

Everyone’s gaze turned to look at Jonis. The boy shuddered.

But instead of running away as perhaps the hunter had expected him to do, Jonis stood tall, raising his thin military blade with a straight arm and a fixed glare. “I know you now. You’re that hunter that ambushed us when I was only four, parading as a magister. You came here for me, didn’t you?”

The magister grinned broadly, exposing his few remaining yellow teeth among the set of silver and gold ones. “At your service, Macoy!”

He swung out with his sword, using his full arm.

Jonis leapt back, blocking with his feeble military rapier. The old man fought as if all his muscles were springs, bounding with fury that could not be stilled. It was all Jonis could do to keep from harming the old man in his own defense. With judgement so declared, he was sure even his friend would not stand by him.

Another swipe and a charge at the young Cordril’s chest, Jonis fought with what strength his ancestors had left to him, with what protection the military had bestowed with presumption to be a fitting weapon. Unfortunately, he heard that ominous clang, watching his sword break off into a stump.

The magister cackled, lifting his sword point to Jonis’s neck.

“Now, I will take your head back to Pringsley and collect the bounty,” the ancient man hissed, exposing his old and rotting brown and yellow teeth.

Jonis slapped the sword to the left. The tip scraped his neck along the other scar the Cordril in Harsall had given him, luckily not skewering him. He reached up and grabbed the sword hilt, striking the magister in the chest with his booted heel.

The old man topped back into the earth.

Both had to scramble off the ground. However, Jonis now had the sword. He lifted it, feeling the familiar weight in his hands as if it were his father’s own broadsword. Looking down at the old magister, Jonis lowered the point.

“How dare you come here to hunt me for bounty,” Jonis shouted. “You don’t care about justice or these people! I remember you clearly now.”

Jonis lowered the neck of his collar, exposing another scar on the other side of his neck. It was faint but real.

“You nearly killed me then too. My father saved me from you. I don’t know why he let you live though. He should have killed you.”

He heard Lt. Gillway gasp. The others also backed away from him, staring at Jonis with a renewed fear.

Jonis stabbed the sword in the ground, clenching his teeth. He rested his hand gently on the butt end. “We are going to talk now. You are going to listen.”

The magister narrowed his eyes, wiping saliva from the corner of his mouth, still holding his chest. “I don’t have to do any such thing, boy.”

“Oh, yes you do,” Jonis countered. He fiddled with the buckle on his gloves as if he were going to take them off. “Because you are running around with a misconception in your head, and I want it cleared up.”

Glancing over at the lieutenant and then at the other men in his group, Jonis said, “I did not kill my mother. She committed suicide.”

Lt. Gillway nodded. “You told me that already, Jonis. You don’t have to convince us.”

“Yes, he does,” Lt. Pratch snapped, stomping forward. “What is this about a bounty on your head?”

“I didn’t remember it until now,” Jonis said with exhaustion, feeling blood drip from his cut down his neck. It seeped into his collar. “I was four the last time this psycho attacked my father and I. But if you want to know, yes, my father is guilty for killing Gale Havers. He was an old tired man, desperate for an heir.” Jonis looked at the ground and shook his head. “So he absorbed Mr. Havers, pretended to be him, and slept with the man’s wife. My mother killed herself when she saw that I was a Cordril.”

“Murderer,” hissed the magister, grinning devilishly. “Now you all know he deserves to die. Give me my sword so I can finish the job.”

Jonis lifted his eyes in a glare. “I deserve to die because I was born? That is utterly unfair!”

“No one wanted you to be born!” the magister hissed. He shouted louder this time. “Give me my sword!”

“Give him his sword,” the patriarch muttered, nodding and stepping away from Jonis.

Shaking his head, Jonis clenched the sword end. “No. I don’t wish to die.”

“You deserve to die,” the patriarch said.

Jonis continued to glare. “No. Even my mother didn’t kill me when she could have. She stabbed only herself. I was defenseless. She could have killed me first.”

“She was distraught,” the patriarch argued, looking from magister to Cordril. “She wasn’t thinking clearly!”

“That’s right,” the magister shouted. “She was unable to make such a choice. Motherly instinct preserved your life.”

“Women are not so mechanical as you think,” Jonis replied calmly, leaning back with a confidence older than his years.

The other soldiers just stared, wondering which side was true. Lt. Gillway had heard only a sliver of Jonis’s woes. This was full new to him.

“What do you know about women, demon?” the magister snapped, reaching for a knife at his side.

“My mother touched me, kissed me before she killed herself,” Jonis said blinking calmly at him. “I heard all her last thoughts. She