The Dragon Chedupuram and the Knight Starkiller (© Biswapriya Purkayastha)
Page 2 "That’s as may be." The Wizard Nameless unfolded a sheet of
vellum, which was covered in arcane diagrams. It seemed a curious sheet of
vellum, for under his finger the lines and symbols moved and writhed as though
alive. "You wish to understand the structure of the realities, and you want to
know that because you want to discover how to control them." "Yes." The stool was low and hard, and the knight Starkiller
shifted uncomfortably in his armour. "You will tell me." "That, I can’t, because I don’t know." His finger still on
the vellum, the Wizard Nameless looked up at the knight. "But I can tell you
how to find out." "Tell me," the knight Starkiller said. "I will not be
ungrateful. Even a wizard as great as you will have need of the protection of a
champion like myself." The Wizard Nameless smiled drily. "You can think of the realities,"
he said, "as a series of concentric shells, nested one inside the other – and
each reality has its own truths, its own circumstances, its own fallacies. Only
at the very centre of the realities, the core where they all meet, lies the
truth of their existence – and, it may be, the means of their control. But you
will not get to that centre." "Why not?" The knight Starkiller hunched forward on the
stool, angrily. "Why do you say that I can’t get to that centre?" "Reality is not unprotected." The Wizard Nameless moved his
finger on the vellum, and the lines and symbols swirled and danced. "The centre
is hidden from all the realities – and guarded. "Coiled around the centre," continued the Wizard Nameless,
"lies the dragon Chedupuram. He is the mightiest entity in all the realities,
second only to the centre itself. It is his task to protect it from all comers,
and he never rests in fulfilling that duty." "The dragon Chedupuram," the knight repeated. "I have slain
dragons." "Chedupuram is no ordinary dragon," the wizard told him. "He
is nothing like any dragons you have encountered, no matter how mighty a knight
you may be." He shook his head so that his mane of white hair fell like a
waterfall around his shoulders. "I would strongly urge you to be satisfied with
what you have, the fealty and awe of this reality. Few, in all the realities,
have anything approaching what you possess, and virtually none has as much. Do
not throw it away in seeking what is not for you to know." "That’s for me to decide." The knight Starkiller rose from
the stool. "How do I get to the centre of the realities, around which the
dragon lies?" "If you want to go there," the Wizard Nameless said, "you
will have to travel between the realities, in the Unworld, until you come to
the realm of the dragon Chedupuram himself. I can tell you the way, but once
you are there, you’re on your own." "And how shall I know when I’m there? What is the dragon
Chedupuram like?" "You will, of course, see him in terms that your own senses
can interpret; he would appear quite different to someone from another reality.
Remember that he spans all the realities, and exists in some measure in all of
them. As to how you will know when you have reached his realms, don’t worry, he
will let you know just as soon as you get there." Tracing lines on the vellum,
the Wizard Nameless then told the knight how to reach the realms of the dragon.
"But," he finished, "I advise you not to do it." "I thank you, Wizard," the knight replied formally. "I will
fulfil my obligation to myself, defeat the foul dragon, and conquer reality.
Then, victorious, I shall be back to see you, and throw your warning in your
face." "I’ll wait." The wizard called Nameless smiled grimly. "I
think," he said to himself, "that I will be waiting a long, long time."
Through
the endless dark between the realities rode the knight Starkiller. Around his
path lay the barren, stony wastes of the Unworld, where nothing grew and only
the fugitives and the outcasts of all the realities ventured, creatures so
depraved that there was not one of all the uncountable infinity of realities
where they might find a home. If any of these saw the knight Starkiller, they
gave him a wide berth. [ Continue to page 3 ] |