The Halfyn Heir doesn’t realize that he and the Ice Prince do not speak the same language. In fact, the English language does not exist in the Bright Universe, the existence that the Heir calls home. English existed at some point in the history of the Une-verse and the Ice Prince, along with the inhabitants of the underground city that he protects on Juoil, speak a language derived from English and many other languages of mostly extinct civilizations of the universe, and an English speaker would be able to communicate well enough with the Ice Prince, though specific references would be impossible for a newcomer to the Une-verse to understand without explanation. It should also be noted that English did not exist in the Fonlands, the existence the Heir and the forces of the Vodun traveled from, until the first Unrest, when portals began to appear between the Fonlands and universe Prime 5 where English speaking inhabitants of the Earth existed. Since the Heir was first contacted in his home universe, the Smiting Chamber cast a spell of understanding that allowed the Fonlanders who made contact with the mist of the Chamber, which included any being to ever dwell in the Smiting Chamber even if they did not directly interact with the heptagon that is the source of the mists, to understand any language spoken to them and to be understood in their native language. This spell is so subtle that even some of the Vodun don’t realize they are hearing the native tongue of the beings they speak with from other realities.
The fact that the two do not speak with same language is only pertinent to the present of the Heir and the Ice Prince of the White Corruption because it illustrates the way that the two combine their powers to blast off of the surface of Juoil toward the Heir’s feelings of the Vodun Xêvioso. The Heir is a master of elemental arcana, meaning he has many spells in his arsenal that stir the elements wind, water, mineral, fire, electricity, and magnetism, and those spells bolstered by the powers of the Vodun through his suit, are strong enough to stir the elements of a different spacetime than they originated. The Ice Prince, both his love from his home reality and the one of the Une-verse, demonstrates a mastery of water and the ability to dissipate heat at will, so he is able to decrease the temperature of anything that he focuses his attention on. The Heir and the Ice Prince can combine their skills to create a structure with a source of heat generated by the Heir that is rapidly dispelled by the Prince to produce forward momentum to approach the speed of light. Both the Heir and the Ice Prince of the White Corruption have done this tandem spell before, but they achieved it differently, the Heir using Hand Magic and the Prince using effected words, but despite the incongruity, they manage to rocket themselves into the space of the Une-verse and travel fast for a long distance before their flight is interrupted.
The Heir had been maneuvering the tendrils of space easily; they are abundant, but very large and easy for beings of their size to avoid even at high speeds. It was not a tendril that stopped them, though. It was an explosive conflagration of red and purple energy that rippled up from an asteroid and caused the Heir to shout an abrupt end to the complex tandem spell moving the two, leaving the Prince disoriented.
“Why would you do that without warning?” the Prince asks with annoyance.
“Look,” the Heir points and they both see the intense flames shooting up from an asteroid, staving off tendrils of Une that are large, but much smaller than the largest to dominate the space, and they look like moving snakes.
“Is that one of your compatriots?” the Prince asks.
“I can’t be sure,” the Heir sighs, frustrated at the limitation of his abilities. “I can only sense the Vodun, Maxx the Superguardian, the mmoatia Pultine, and the Hyperion, and I know that it is not any of them. I will have to cast a spell if we don’t want to go closer.”
“Whatever it is is obviously on our side or they wouldn’t be trying to burn those tendrils. It won’t work, not unless whatever it is has a bigger flame…”
Almost in response to the doubt of the Prince, there is an explosion of purple fire from the asteroid that sweeps out like napalm at the tendrils trying to approach before they are engulfed. When the flames recede, there is only ash. Some of the bigger tendrils had been caught up in the flames and were damaged as well. It seems that all of the space around them begins to react in what they assume to be pain.
“Let’s go, it has to be one of us,” the Heir says, leading the Prince to the asteroid.
“The tendrils will start to grow new off-shoots from their wounds and this area will likely be flooded with them. We should try to leave as quickly as we can.” The Ice Prince looks around them as they land on the asteroid and he is worried.
“I know you,” the Heir says to the man on the asteroid who is down on one knee in what looks to be terrible pain. He wears armor as form-fitting as the bodysuit the Heir wears, and it seems to be red from certain vantages, but bold violet from others. There is a pattern like a coffin on his chest similar to the veve of Xêvioso on the Heir’s chest. “Are you ok? Can we help to heal you?”
“I just need a second,” the man says as he forces himself to stand. The coffin pattern on his chest is dented like the rest of his armor and it is clear that he had either taken a beating or crashed into many asteroids before he settled on this one. “Fâ taught me a reverse necrosis spell that acts like healing, it’s just much slower than a healing spell. Don’t waste your energy, Tot. It’s good to see a familiar face. I’m Clay. We only spoke a couple of times before we left the Fonlands, but I have heard a lot about you. I always wanted to ask you where you got that stupid name from, but we didn’t have much time to talk before.” Clay was trying desperately to distract his new friends from the pain that he was in while the spell slowly worked on him.
“Which one?” the Heir and the Ice Prince ask in unison.
“The Halfyn Heir is good, I can’t imagine what it means, but it sounds like a title,” Clay says as he shakes his head, unable to sustain the charade that he is fine, and sits again. “I’m sorry, I just haven’t ever been knocked around like that before.”
“Rest,” the Prince says as he kneels near Clay. He puts his long staff next to him on the ground and lays a large hand on the top of Clay’s head. “I can’t do much, but I can do some healing.”
“This your guy?” Clay smiles at the Heir. “He’s a good one. Ivan and I never learned to heal so if one of us gets hurt in battle together, the other has to max out their power to cover the other.”
“He is a version of my guy,” the Heir explains. “This is his home existence and after the cube exploded, I landed on the planet where he kept others safe from Une.”
“That is beautiful,” Clay says, looking back and forth between the two and annoying the Prince.
“It is not, and please stop moving, you’re just prolonging this,” the Prince says.
“I think it is,” Clay says to the Heir so as not to move his head. “Of all the places for you to end up. I ended up flying toward rocks and my armor has this feature that explodes things that hit me with too much force. It exploded a whole asteroid and that just drew attention to me, that’s why I was fighting off those tendrils.”
“Speaking of,” the Prince says, “we should get going. New tendrils are almost here.”
The Heir looks around and he is alarmed at the number of tendrils approaching them. He casts a quick spell with his hands that circles the three of them in magnetism to move them away from their current location and closer to where he feels Xêvioso in the distance. They don’t move as fast as the Heir and the Prince had been traveling, but it is enough to evade the aggressive tendrils that try to follow them.
“Where does the name Tot come from?” Clay asks as the Heir focuses on his spell and the Prince continues to heal him.
“It’s a name others gave me,” the Heir says. “No name that you know for me was chosen by me or my family. Names are sacred in my existence and names given by family are to be protected against those who would use them to do you harm. I am called Tot by those who needed to get my attention, until I grew up and became known as the Heir. I hope to one day achieve an even greater public name when my Prince and I become the Royals of Halfyn, but if that never happens, I am content.”
The Prince laughs.
“Y’all have a weird dynamic,” Clay says. He feels better and the Ice Prince has removed his hand from his head. They all stand inside of the Heir’s spells as they move through space.
“It’s because he lost his version of me and thinks that I am here to absorb all unsettled feelings,” the Heir says and instantly regrets it.
“I won’t deny that,” the Prince says, “but you can’t deny that I am here with you now. I left all of the beings of Juoil vulnerable to be here, to lend my efforts, I am sorry if it takes me a minute to shake off the past when I see your big beautiful face smiling and inspiring people again. You will just have to deal with it.”
There is an awkward silence inside the construct of the spell.
“We are nearing Xêvioso,” the Heir says after a moment.
“Thank god,” Clay sighs with relief. “Lot of tension in here, y’all. It’s really hard to tell if y’all are mad at each other or in love with each other. Me and Ivan been through some crazy shit, but I I ain’t never experienced something like this. Ice Prince, is it?”
“I am called Dae,” the Prince says.
“Dae, it is very good to have you helping us out, I’m sure Tot wouldn’t have brought you if any of the context stuff was problematic. We’re a team now,” Clay says and puts an arm over both their shoulders. “The only thing that matters now is fucking up Une. We can all agree on that, can’t we?”
Both the Halfyn Heir and the Ice Prince of the White Corruption smile at this.
PRL Serials 