Fred Rexroad

Chapter One: Introduces one of two protagonists; sets timeline for this protagonist’s thread. Foreshadows the magical, mysterious, powerful, though tragic future ahead.

“You’re going to hell and pulling me with you,” the newly apprenticed helper whispered into the ear of the midwife. “Birgitta’s dying, and you’re lying to her. Pope Sixtus would damn you.”

“Shut up and remember your place.” The seasoned jordemor jerked around and grabbed the inexperienced assistant by her straight blonde hair and pulled her away from the bed—out of earshot of the laboring woman, who probably couldn’t hear anyway. With a frightening countenance made eerie by the flickering flame of the well-stocked fireplace, and a clipped voice, she laid out what would be. “Are you God? Do you know the future? Birgitta may die before this ordeal is over, but we need her to help us save the baby—her baby. She must have hope so she doesn’t give up too soon. We will give her hope.”

“There’s so much blood. Lying to a dying woman is a sin. She should know she’s about to meet God.”

“Her soul knows her fate, and the end will come no matter. And by God, there is no sin in helping the dying leave this world in peace.”

The midwife returned to the bedside of the writhing mother—who never would be—and stroked her hand gently as she spoke soothing words. This labor was the most excruciating the old woman had ever witnessed—darkening her thoughts as the young woman’s body tensed and twisted frantically, nearly ripping muscle from bone.

“It will soon be over, Birgitta, and the pain will stop. Everything will be … as it should.”

Her words trailed off as the room darkened. The noonday light filtering through the oiled cloth covering the window dwindled, diverting both women from their chore. The assistant ran to the window and pulled open the cloth shutter, letting in the cold northern air. With more presence of mind, the midwife turned back to her job. “Seal that window and come back here.”

“Everyone is looking up at the sky. Something is happening to the sun. This is because you lied to our friend.” Tears of fear ran down the assistant’s cheeks. “Satan is coming for us!”

“Hush and get over here,” the midwife ordered without turning away from the straining mother. “Another push, Birgitta. You can do it.” The fae want this, she thought.

Dying daylight and hideous screams made her job more difficult, though the agony of the young woman trying to become a mother distracted from the commotion building outside the bedroom window. A crowd had gathered in the square of the Finnish settlement within the Kalmar Union. Agitated villagers shifted their attention between the screams coming from the living quarters above the mercantile shop and the blackening sky. Their murmurs grew louder as the noon sunlight dimmed to nothing. If they had understood the physics of relativity—knowledge still hundreds of years in the future—they would have noticed a star in the constellation Libra, appearing as a thin ring around the disappearing sun.

The startled midwife glanced toward the window, where the world had gone dark. “What’s happening out there? I need light!” she shouted to her assistant, who continued to stare awestruck out the window.

“The sun is dying,” the girl screamed. “I told you something was wrong. You are an evil woman.” The tears increased.

Before she could process the ending of the world or the insolence of her young assistant, Birgitta’s screams brought the midwife’s attention back to her duties. She yelled to the girl, “Get me more candles!” then turned to the crowning head of the baby fighting to be born. “The world’s ending,” she whispered. “What a time to be born.” I hope the fae know what they are doing. My dream wasn’t like this. The world didn’t end and Syncothia said … her thoughts drifted away.

The assistant opened the door where the father-to-be waited fretfully at the top of the stairs. The weathered man, with several days’ growth of youthful beard not hiding his appearing closer to thirty than he should, had already gathered two more hand-dipped candles of the finest bees’ wax and was fumbling to light them with a pilke from his shop’s fireplace. When the first one caught, he used it to light the second and handed them both to the trembling assistant.

“How’s it going?” he asked in a cracking voice.

The assistant quickly lowered her gaze and backed away without answering. Kicking the door shut with her foot, she hurried to place one candle on a table near the door and held the other high as she knelt to help.

Several tense moments passed as the darkness continued. The midwife used what little light she had and her experienced touch to guide the baby as best she could.

“The head is out,” called the midwife, as her expression changed and a relieved look grew on her face, in contrast to the dreadful scene. “Face up.”

“Isn’t that unusual?” asked the assistant, her shadowed face shrouded in fear.

“Everything about this birth is unusual.”

The midwife grabbed the candle and held it over the partially born baby.

“I think this one will be fine. The soul has already entered the body.”

“Isn’t there always a soul?”

The older woman handed the candle back. “No, God doesn’t place a soul in the unborn. And even then, it takes time. Sometimes minutes or hours. I’ve seen it take days.”

“How can you tell?” The assistant had a look of disbelief—it didn’t match with what her Sabbath-day instructions told. Birth was birth. Soul was soul. One went with the other.

With another agonizing push from the mother, the left shoulder emerged—and stopped. Without taking her attention away from the baby, the midwife answered her assistant.

“Look at the eyes. When you see the eyes looking back into yours, that is the signal that God has accepted one for mortality. When the eyes open and look around, that’s the soul getting its bearings after coming down from heaven. This one is not fully born and already has a soul. That’s special. Someone is in a hurry to start life.”

As she uttered the word life, the mother’s screams stopped, her damp body went limp. The assistant rushed to place an ear against her chest, as the midwife had taught—careful not to drip candle wax on Birgitta.

“She’s dead,” the assistant whispered as she turned a questioning eye to the midwife. “You should have told her. Now, Satan is waiting for you … for us.” Tears dripped freely from her eyes.

“Hush, child, we still have a baby to save. One death, not two today. Push down on her belly. You must push the baby out.”

The assistant timidly set the candle down and obeyed—gently pressing on the abdomen of the cooling mother.

“Harder. You can’t hurt Birgitta. Push hard.”

As the assistant pushed and the midwife pulled, the right shoulder presented itself. With more forceful pushes by the assistant, the baby—a girl—wriggled out. The baby cried, and the mother didn’t respond. Then, as quickly as it had left, the sun’s light returned, making the room as bright as it had been before. The midwife examined the newborn girl, being deliberately slow, for she knew the heartbreak her following task would confirm. With tears in her own eyes, she handed the crying baby to the assistant to clean up.

With halting movements and a tearful expression, she turned to the mother, whom she knew well. I remember birthing you, my sweet Birgitta—not but twenty-two years ago, she thought as she checked for all the things she knew to look for. Sorrowfully, she covered the woman from head to toe and blew out the candles before turning to the window. “What kind of dreadful omen is this?”

She gave herself the indulgence of crying for a moment, along with the newborn, before taking the tightly wrapped baby in her arms and steeling herself for the next task in her usually cheerful job. “You’re not a magical, my little dear … or can I just not see it?” she whispered to the newborn, then motioned for her assistant to open the door.

The assistant, still shaking from the ordeal and showing anger at her mentor, opened the bedroom door, allowing the midwife to exit. The midwife took slow steps toward the bedroom door. I hope the fae are in control. She carried the infant through the doorway with that hope … and fear.

 

STORY STATEMENT

            I have two protagonists from vastly different times and places. Wenzel Voegelin and Vakeva Gullveig. Their separate stories merge near the end of this manuscript.

1) Wenzel must stop Magzaar, the sorcerer who massacred his family—among others. Upon failing he must find his chosen successor before the unstoppable death from the sorcerer’s curse takes him.

2) Vakeva settles into a semblance of her pre-orphan existence but takes an unbelievable detour when she meets the dying Wenzel. She must first believe, then learn what magic is and how to control it; and come to terms with Wenzel’s story of the evil sorcerer Magzaar, who will return one day.

ANTAGONIST OR ANTAGONISTIC FORCE

Wenzel’s antagonist is the sorcerer Magzaar. Magzaar was tormented and neglected as a child—because he was a sorcerer. His father, a wizard, mistreated him under the guise of teaching him to be tough and thus successful in the world. His mother couldn’t give him love to compensate. He was secretly tutored by a mysterious rouge faerie who showed him magic—without context or full information—to protect himself from his father. Magzaar felt the unknown magic was for much more than stopping his father. He felt the fae chose him to rule over the magical world, and using them to rule the whole world. Fear was his tool. He had to use whatever means he had to make people fear. Mortals were expendable—"after all, they had such pitifully short lives, anyway."

Vakeva’s antagonist is life and Mr. Dwire. Dwire, the town blacksmith, agreed to care for Vakeva until permanent arrangements could be made. Once he had control of all her money and possessions, he kept her around as free labor while freely spending her money ‘on her upkeep.’ Within a year, the money was gone and even her horse is sold. Later, her antagonist will become Magzaar.

TITLE

1)    Wizard Earth

2)    The Wizard Realm Saga: Wizard Earth

3)    In Medias Res: The Wizard Realm Saga (Book 1)

COMPS

Heidi meets The Magicians.

The First Binding by R.R. Virdi: layered timelines, parallel character development, and mythological underpinnings.

The Magicians by Lev Grossman: Magic hidden around the normal world we all experience with a few chosen ones having access to it—an antagonist whose power is unknown.

CORE WOUND AND THE PRIMARY CONFLICT (hook or logline)

A young orphan strikes out on her own in 15^th century Ireland, enduring hardship and attacks until the night she meets a strange old man with an unbelievable story … and a gift.

OTHER MATTERS OF CONFLICT

WENZEL:
Primary (inner): Wenzel’s happy life is torn apart when the Roman army (guided by Magzaar) attacks his family’s farm, killing all—except Wenzel, who plays dead to survive. Severely wounded and hungry, he must leave the farm and the graves he dug for his parents and brothers. For two years he roams from town to town working for food and a place to sleep. All the while, the black eyes of the mysterious man watching the massacre on the hilltop, haunts his dreams. The thoughts don’t dwindle even after he becomes a wizard. So, he makes it his life’s work to stop this man he discovers is the Sorcerer Magzaar. He must avenge his family.

(Hypothetical scenario): The man then turned away from the crowd as he moved to mount his horse. This gave Wenzel an unobstructed front view. The recognition hit him hard. Magzaar.

He had not met the sorcerer, but he’d seen him twice before. The black eyes of a sorcerer were obvious, but the perpetual scowl that most sorcerers did not exhibit solidified the recognition. The sorcerer’s gaze descended upon Wenzel. “A wizard, I see.” He tossed the reins to the closest warlock and stepped toward the nervous Wenzel. “And why is a wizard encroaching on this tranquil coven?”

“I pay my respects to all magicals as I make my travels.” He stayed on his horse but bent forward in a bow of deference without appearing condescending. “Sorcerers included, Magzaar.”

“So, you know me. But I don’t recall meeting you …”

“I am Wenzel of Voegelin.”

“Voegelin? I knew that region. The Romans seemed to have made it … disappear.”

“That they did. My family with it.”

“I never cared for the Romans,” said Magzaar. “Great ingenuity, with the help of your fellow wizards, but their ability to acquire far outpaced their ability to hold. A major shortcoming.”

The thought of wizards helping to advance the Romans had an ill effect on Wenzel, but he quickly let it dissipate. “I hold no grudge against the general populace for the acts of a few men and their leaders.”

“Only weak men walk away from such a vicious affront without exacting revenge. I can help you with that, and I can always use a strong wizard on my team.”

“I thank you for the offer, Sorcerer Magzaar, but I prefer to find my own solutions to my chosen battles.”

Secondary (social): Wenzel’s self-appointed goal is to rid the world of the evil propagated by Magzaar. To do this, he must kill Magzaar—a sorcerer, not an easy task. He spends centuries following rumors of lost spells and curses that a wizard could use to kill a sorcerer. Every turn becomes a dead end until a rumor of a Guardian Witch hiding ancient scrolls makes it to his ears. The most promising clue he’s ever had brings him to the Alas Purwo Forest on the island of Java. He finds the witch, but Magzaar beat him there and destroyed the scrolls. Fifteen hundred years of searching and he arrives too late. There are no more rumors to follow.

(Hypothetical scenario): “From time to time we get visitors looking for something. They know not what, but they too follow rumors and we are a coven keeping secrets—that much is obvious to the world. Secrets attract the curious—even if they don’t know what they seek.”

“So, I have to prove my worthiness for you to show me the scrolls?”

“I can’t show you the scrolls. But nobody believes I can’t give what they want. They’ve built up in their mind that I have their answers.”

Another cryptic game? I’ll go along and see where it leads. Wenzel began. “Each wizard has a goal they choose as their life’s work—”

“I’ve learned about wizards. I’ve met wizards. That doesn’t change reality. I can’t show you the scrolls.”

She’s not saying she doesn’t have them. How do I convince her to show me the scrolls? He continued. “There is a terrible influence spreading over the world. My chosen life’s work is to stop it. Stop the one who’s causing it.”

“I may live in an isolated forest within a great big world, but my life has been studying that world. I know bad things and bad people come and go. Why is now any different?”

“Each iteration gets worse. He who stokes it gets better at it each time.”

“You make it sound as if the bad influence is a single person, but these things have gone on forever, ruled by different men each time. Men die and their dreams die as well.”

“The men who make it into the history you learned, are puppets. The real culprit is the Sorcerer Magzaar. I am after Magzaar. He will not die.”

At the sound of the name, the Guardian froze.

Wenzel straightened up at the Guardian’s recognition of the name. “Do you know this sorcerer?”

“You may have heard rumors, among the many you heard about Alas Purwo, that wizards and sorcerers come here to show themselves to lesser magicals and mortals … to play with us.” She smiled widely. “Well, that is true. One of them was the Sorcerer Magzaar. He also sought the scrolls. The first time he came, nearly two thousand years ago, he slaughtered many of our coven, but I, the Guardian Witch, would not reveal the scrolls. Our willingness to be killed without a hint of revealing the truth convinced him that there were no scrolls.”

“You said ‘the first time.’ He returned?”

“Yes. The second time was about five hundred years ago. He killed many more of us, including me, the body of the Guardian Witch. And he took the scrolls. All of them. There were three.”

Wenzel dropped his head to the table. Sugayatri noticed this and ran toward him, though the invisible barrier Wenzel had created blocked her approach. She yelled for Untung to prepare to defend as Wenzel raised his head, sensing a problem outside the barrier. He signaled to Sugayatri that he was safe, and she returned to her table. But she kept her eyes on Wenzel.

"You seem more disheartened than I expected, Wenzel. What does this mean to you?"

"My visions and research tell me those scrolls contained many powerful spells and curses. Spells even the sorcerers don't know. But one in particular, the one I have been seeking for nigh on a millennium and a half, had the power to stop Magzaar. And he has them. May the Gods help us if he learns the power within them."

"Then maybe it is consolation to learn that he doesn't have them."

"What? You said he took them."

"He did. After rolling through each one, he burned them in the firepit not ten feet behind you.”

Wenzel turned on his seat and looked at the firepit. “That may be worse. If he still had them, there was a possibility that we could somehow get them. But destroyed … I have run out of possibilities. There is no way to stop him.”

VAKEVA:

Primary (inner): Vakeva, never knowing her mother, spent her early life helping and protecting her father and at a very young age had mapped out her future. When her father died—she was only ten years old—her future died with him. Not knowing any other way, she wants to restart that life as much as possible. However, her loyalty (even to those who’ve cheated her) and a budding romance presented roadblocks. She must reconcile which parts of her dreamlife to pursue.

(Hypothetical scenario) Mr. Dwire, the local blacksmith and his wife took Vakeva in after her father died, when she thought others had abandoned her. For a year they treated her well. However, unknown to her, they depleted the money and other resources her father had when he died. During the year, she became quite helpful to the blacksmith. She helped around the shop and delivered finished products. She was content but sad. Then she got some encouragement.

“The trick now is to find what makes you happy.”

“I would love to be on the road again, with Papa. The next best thing would be to continue what we were doing. I love bringing to people the things they need.”

“Then find a way to do that. My visions show me you can.”

“Visions? That sounds like witchcraft.”

The lady did not respond to the charge. “Think beyond the Dwires, my dear.”

“Except for spending my money, Mr. and Mrs. Dwire have been so good to me. They’ve grown to depend on me. I can’t just leave them.”

“They did alright before you arrived and they’ll do fine when you’re gone. And from the talk in town, you’ve more than paid in money and service for what they did for you.”

Secondary (social): Starting the day she is born, Vakeva’s life throws curve balls at her. Her mother dies, a witch tells her father she is special, and the townsfolk pity her for her circumstances. She settles into a wonderful life on the road selling things with her father who then dies when she’s ten, leaving her with a protector in an unknown town who steals all the money her father left. Still quite young, she breaks away and resumes the life of a traveling pedlar only to be attacked and kidnapped. Eventually, even as she gets everything she thinks she wants, including love, she realizes that it isn’t the future she dreamed of. As she tries to reconcile this, her world is once again torn apart by the (apparently) chance meeting with a crazy old man who says he’s a wizard.

(Hypothetical scenario) As she sets out to begin her new (old) life as a traveling pedlar she is taught how to defend herself:

Mr. Macarthy stabbed the knife into the wood of the table and fished a well-used sharpening stone out of his pocket. Using the care of a father, he showed her how to keep the knife sharp. His second lesson was how to hold it, to stab or fend off any wild game that may threaten her.

“And lastly …” He became quite serious. “Your biggest threat when traveling alone will be robbers. Defending against them is different than with a wild animal. Humans can think. And be sneaky.”

Mr. MacCarthy spent the next hour teaching Vakeva how to hold, hide, and use the knife.

“One more thing. When they find out you’re a lass … it may get worse. It won’t only be your money they’re after. You know what I mean?”

“You’re the second person who told me something like that. What do robbers do to lassies?”

“With no mother to tell you these things, I guess your father didn’t think it was time. But now is the time.” MacCarthy hesitated, his brow furrowed with worry, and he didn’t know how to go on. “Ailis,” he called to his wife. “I think you need to have this talk with Vakeva. I’ll be at the pub.”

SKETCH OUT SETTING

This story follows three characters from vastly different times and locations. The sorcerer Magzaar was born thousands of years ago, the wizard Wenzel was born early in the first century of the common era, and Vakeva was born in 1474. The locations are there to support the structure of the story, but (except in a few instances) are not crucial to the plot.

The story opens with the tragic birth of Vakeva in a small town in the eastern reaches of the Kalmar Union, in what is now Finland. She moves with her widowed father to the English-ruled Dublin Pale shortly after. She and her father travel between the Pale and outlying towns of Medieval Ireland to sell wares. Upon his untimely death, she is trapped in one of these Irish towns until she breaks out on her own and resumes her father’s trade routes. Her life is confined to the small towns of medieval Ireland, with an occasional visit to Dublin, until her sixteenth year. These small towns have the usual assortment of shops, taverns, and parochial people.

In the second chapter, we meet a young Wenzel on his family farm somewhere east of a river that becomes known as the Rhein in the early decades of the common era. He becomes orphaned and roams what is now southern Germany for a couple of years before meeting a man who makes him a wizard and stays to be his mentor. He travels to several locations that I have pictured in my mind, but are only vaguely pinpointed in the narrative. They end up in Armenia within sight of Mount Ararat.

As Wenzel becomes a fully trained wizard, he moves back to a vague location in a mountainous region of Germany. As his ultimate battle with Magzaar approaches, in the year 1491, Bardsey Island, also known as the Island of 20,000 saints, becomes important. As an infant traveling to Ireland with her father, Vakeva takes an interest as they pass this island. The lore and legend of the island play an important part in the story plot. This island is believed to be the location of Merlin’s grave, under the Glass Tower, protecting the Thirteen Treasures of British myth. I rely on the isolation and mythology to make this place a likely battleground between a wizard and a sorcerer.

After the battle, a dying Wenzel makes his way across the Irish Sea to find his successor. He travels through 15th century Ireland to meet a fellow wizard in Dublin and then to the interior of Ireland to find a girl his fae-inspired dreams revealed.

I have my antagonist, Magzaar’s, early story in a vague location, that I see (but don’t describe) as possibly southeast Europe or the northern part of the Middle East. There is an apple orchard, which is very important to the growth of my antagonist, but I don’t intend to draw similarities to the Garden of Eden. Magzaar moves to a mountaintop that is also vaguely in southeastern Europe (perhaps in the region of modern-day Kosovo.)

Several locations are special to the magical side of this story:

Wizard Sanctuaries are sets of rooms that each wizard has. Sanctuaries are entered through special doorways from the Wizard’s home. These magical rooms contain what each wizard needs to fulfill his/her purpose in life: libraries, workshops, gardens, laboratories, studios, etc. Each sanctuary has an entrance to the Wizard Keepe that only the correct wizard with the current incantation may open. The actual location of these sanctuaries is somewhere in the faerie realm.

Wizard Keepe is a place where all the wizards throughout the world may congregate. It’s basically like a grand hotel or retreat. One of the rooms is the Council Chamber for the elected leadership of The Wizard Realm. This chamber has a room, known as the Infinity Room, that has the power to be anything/place needed. (Not unlike Star Trek’s Holodeck or Harry Potter’s Room of Requirement.) This Keepe is located on the magical planet Terrafae, though the wizards are unaware of this. It is contained under a mountain structure on the planet next to a similar place for the sorcerers, the Citadel. There is no possible entrance between the planet’s surface and the Keepe.

Citadel is a magical place where the sorcerers of the world meet—they don’t have an intermediary place like the Wizard’s Sanctuaries. In essence, it serves the same purpose as the Wizard Keepe, but it is a castle-like structure on the surface of Terrafae, between the pink ocean and blue mountains. Sorcerers can travel the surface of Terrafae as they do on the Earth. Through the Citadel, a sorcerer can enter the Connection.

Sorcerers cannot enter the Keepe and wizards cannot enter the Citadel—just one of those strange laws of the fae.

Connection is a place where sorcerers may communicate with the fae—when the fae wish. Special ceremonies and events take place there. This is also connected to Citadels of sorcerers from other planets within the galaxy. Earth’s sorcerers are free to commune with those from other planets. They may even visit other planets.

Terrafae is a planet orbiting a double star known (to Earth astronomers) as Kappa Librae. It is the magical center of the galaxy. It has oceans, mountains, and plains like Earth, but the sea is a pinkish color that turns purplish between the settings of the two suns. There are non-magical inhabitants of Terrafae, but they have no real part in the early stories of this saga.

Kappa Librae is known in the magical realm as the Wizard Star. The Wizard Star is actually the smaller of the two (Kappa Librae2), but earth magicals were unaware of the double nature of the star during the timeframe of this story. The larger star (Kappa Librae1) is known as the Sorcerer Star to greater magicals (sorcerers and the fae.)

The rare alignment of the two suns Kappa Librae1 and Kappa Librae2, Terrafae, our sun, our moon, and the earth happens in October of the year 1474, during the birth of Vakeva.