Chapter 14: Joining

Storm and Sarah had been on their way to Silver City when Alexus had called them.

They then stayed with them for a few days to them to help out, before heading to Silver City. Now that Alexus’s had his apprentice’s box working, he and Penny believed they could get things, up and running during the winter season ahead.

Kale and Selwyn planned to help the couple for a few more days before joining David and Kelli in what was to be their new home in Nickle City. Kale and Selwyn were having a lot of fun tripping around the planet.

The day after Olivia left, JJ reported to Storm that they were getting visitors. Upon hearing the names of the visitors, Storm blinked to Nickle City to collect David and Kelli, as he knew David would love the surprise he had in store for him.

Zarka re-aligned the ship to Silver City and flew to the coordinates JJ had given them. The little droid who came aboard once they were in the hanger deck, said they had to be immunised. He was very perplexed once he checked his samples to determine the immunisations they required.

“Goodness, someone very powerful has created your personal vaccines. We will have to get the Lord Wizard to look at these,” he told them. He happily let them off the ship and pointed them to the doors to enter the receiving area where the wizards met them.

Raina didn’t have to think hard about who was who. Zarka happily hugged her sister and David and Storm both groaned on seeing her. They thought Sarah was a handful. Storm was wondering who she would end up with and then picked up her close connection to DT and KJ.

To their surprise, they learnt that in the scheme of things, Zarka was technically a lot older and she looked older than Sarah did. Both men recognised she had a lot more maturity about her. She also glowed differently to Sarah, which intrigued them both.

Raina was delighted to meet Storm, her dad. When they hugged, they both felt as if a part of themselves had been returned that they had known had been missing. They felt an instant connection and a contentment that they had finally found each other. It had been a long hug.

Raina filled Storm in on where they had been. Storm was sad about the fact that her mother Annette had died tragically. However, he was absolutely delighted to have Raina coming to live in his new home. He knew his other partners, Lindell and Kim, would love her and Ben.

Lee had given Raina a file that had copies of her family tree back about eight generations from her time and forwards to Queen Wizard Lee’s present time. Lee had also included what she knew about each person. Raina told Storm that she had a feeling that Lee wanted him to have a copy.

Storm was very happy to receive it. He would at least learn about what happened to his other kids even if he would never get to meet them. He had always suspected that the child Annette carried was special and he now knew why she was. He was delighted that his granddaughter, Dana, had also become a mage.

Raina also passed on the items Sean had given her to give to Storm. Storm looked at the crystal power blocks and the solar cells with interest and beamed at Raina. “If I ever get to meet this Lord Sean Watson, I’m going to kiss him,” he told her and kissed her instead.

David was also pleased that Dana was happy and was amazed that they were now grandparents. At only twenty-six, this was a little hard to get his head around. He was however tickled that Trixy, his daughter with Dana, was a Lord Wizard. It was also hard to think of Raina and Ben as his in-laws.

Kelli was sad to hear that her parents had died in the catastrophe that hit her ancestors’ home worlds. She was pleased that the boxes had effectively stayed in the family by going to David’s daughter and that she was married to a Grandteli descendant.

David looked at Raina and Ben and said to Storm, “Well I’ve found all my wizards what about you?”

Storm gave him a rueful look, “I think I still have some work to do, I’m still missing three. How about you take yours and get Federation sorted out, and I’ll take the rest to enjoy a summer season in Unna.”

Raina mentioned she had other presents and gave Storm, Kelli, and David the bracelets Lee had given her. She also gave Storm the spare multi-functional communication and data pad that Lee called a ‘Mad’. Sarah connected to it with Storm, and they both smiled.

“Ours is very similar, but I love the database of spells Lee had developed, it is a much better set-up than ours. I also like the way they have restricted access to spells until other skills are learned. Much safer,” Storm told her.

“With JJ’s help, I can do a mass update to include the extra features, Storm,” Sarah told him. Storm agreed this would be great, and so Sarah did it.

Storm said the bracelets were a better design than the ones he had found and he would make the new bracelets for the other wizards and apprentices. “I’ll restrict them for now until we locate the rest of the corrupted magical items. Then I’ll supply them to the top level mages outside of the wizard families,” he told the group of people with him.

David and Kelli agreed that they would do the same. Raina gave half the wyvern eggs to Storm and told him that they contained baby dragons, which Trixy had called wyverns as they were a smaller breed and didn’t have the extra front arms her dragonets, and the big dragons did.

Sarah was fascinated with the eggs and couldn’t wait to see them hatch. Raina told them that Trixy had suggested that they would be best to do it when they had all their wizards together.

Reluctantly, she agreed and found a safe place on her ship to keep them.

The next day, David headed back to Nickle City with his new wizards.

He introduced them to his Prol miners. He explained how most of the people on this continent got here and that Raina and Ben were a different type of wizards to Lord Storm and his people. He informed them that they were what he called Marquess Wizards.

They were not as strong magical as Storm was individually, but they were more powerful in their disciplines than his other four wizards and their apprentices, as they seemed more diverse in their functionality. He also explained they were a set of six and appeared to be paired.

DT had mentioned to him that Ben and Raina made a good pair. She was the adrenaline junky and jumped into things boots and all and it didn’t take much to fire her up. Ben was the thinker, and if left to brood, he would over think everything to death. DT had said that the couple had trouble getting on the same wavelength when they first met.

David showed them the two wizard’s boxes and asked them to pick. He wasn’t surprised when Raina picked the Energy box, and Ben picked Lore. David had worked out the boxes were paired to balance each partner. He hoped once the couple were linked as wizards it would help the couple settle down.

When they opened the boxes, their bling disappeared. They were both surprised by this. David explained it would return to the box and the box to the Zarka’s ship if that were where it was anchored. Zarka could find new owners for it the box’s when she needed to.

He had examined the new spells Lee had added to Ben and Raina’s old bling, and they agreed they should be included in the other magician’s boxes as well. Since they had four of the wizards of the Sextet, they found between them, it was easy to add the extra spells.

David had long suspected that his wizards worked better as a team. He had enjoyed working with Kale and Selwyn in Golden City. He and Kelli got the new wizards settled in and were organising dinner when Kale and Selwyn turned up.

They were delighted to find that the sextet was now complete. Kale and Selwyn said that they felt something had happened as they both had felt happiness from their bling. Kale stated that they should all touch and bond as a completed set.

They formed a circle in their pairs and joined hands. They all shook as the power of their joining shot through them. They all learned the strengths and weakness of their counterparts, and it simply blew their minds as they bonded as one entity.

They collapsed to the floor. Groggily the group sat up and found after the ring had broken they hadn’t released their partners. They all grinned at each other. They were bonded, as they should be. They would always be stronger with their partner than alone.

When together as the sextet, they were bloody powerful. They also knew if one of them joined another pair, their strength would be doubled. Two pairs as they had used earlier was formidable. It was intoxicating and a little frightening for the new wizards.

Kale said, “I don’t think we should join like that again unless we really have to. That is only for massive life-threatening situations.”

Not one of them disagreed with him.

Before the magicians went to Unna, Storm said he had a few things to do.

The first thing he did was buy a hotel. He had contacted Olivia and stated that he needed a place big enough for about eight or nine couples. Olivia contacted her mother’s organiser Daron and asked him what was available for eight couples.

He thought rationally and stated, “Olivia at this time of year not very much. Even the bigger hotels are rented out for the season. We will be filled to the rafters as anyone who is anyone will be town to see who you pick as your husband or try to be your choice.”

Daron startled when he heard Storm’s voice come from the device on Olivia’s arm, “What about a fixer-upper?”

“Pardon?” he said.

“A large building with lots of bedrooms that needs repairs, so it is currently empty,” Storm tried.

“Oh! Yes, hum,” he said frowning in thought. He contemplated the request and then clicked his fingers. “What about the Tempest Hotel?”

“Tell me more,” Storm came back, chuckling at the name of the hotel.

“It’s located smack in the middle of town, and it is an eye-sore. It has twenty once luxurious double room apartments and twenty-four servants’ rooms. They used to keep half for the live-in workers and the other half for the servants of visitors. It had a restaurant that could seat eighty people and a small ballroom capable of handling two hundred guests,” Daron replied.

“Who owns it?” Storm asked.

Daron smiled broadly, “Olivia does.”

“What?” Olivia said shocked.

“It was given to your sister Karen as a wedding gift. But she and Randell never did anything with it. It was run down even then. When she died, what was hers became yours,” Daron explained to her.

Olivia lifted her arm, “Lord Storm if you want it, it’s yours.”

“Perfect, I’ll go you halves. Once we leave, a manager can rent it out for us,” said Storm. Olivia agreed as it made sense to her that it was better earning her money than sitting vacant. It wasn’t doing anyone any good in its current state.

Storm had JJ find him the building, and then he blinked to it, to look it over. As Daron said, it really needed some TLC. Storm looked around. ‘This city really needs better garbage collection, ‘ he thought.

He walked behind the building and grinned. Someone had been using the back garden and carriage house as a dumpsite. The rubbish wouldn’t be there much longer he decided. He walked through the four stories high building and looked into each room.

The top two floors had ten twin-roomed units each. They were accessed by stairs at one end of the building. The second flight of stairs was located between the third and fourth rooms at the rear of the building. A set of units and a small open area with seating was opposite these stairs.

Each large bedroom on the top two floors had a bathing chamber and a large walk-in clothes closet. The twin bedrooms were divided by a small lounging space. The entrance to the units opened into a small personal dining area for four that joined into the lounging space.

The second floor was split into the twenty-four servant’s rooms. Fourteen rooms ran along the front of the building. Six rooms were in one back corner and then the last four rooms. The stairs that lead to each floor were in the back corner.

There was no access from the middle set of stairs on this floor. ‘A fire warden would have a fit, ‘ thought Storm. The floor space left over in the middle of the second floor had a cramped dining area for the servants and two very unpleasant tiny bathing chambers for them all to use.

The bottom floor had two-fifths of the space being used as the ballroom. A modest reception area with a foyer sat between the ballroom and the restaurant. Doors led into the ballroom, the restaurant and the central stairwell beside the reception desk. A small office, storage and a cloakroom were behind the reception desk.

Behind the seating area of the restaurant was a decent sized kitchen. Storm found the corner stairs led into the kitchen past a rest/change room for the staff. Public toilets were under the stairs for the restaurant and the second set of bathrooms and a serving area were located at the back of the ballroom.

The second doorway in ballroom led to a back patio and the rear carriage area. The patio ran down to the kitchen and provided the servants with a path to the ballroom out of the worst of the weather.

The basement was accessed from the stairs at the end of the building. It contained the boiler, the laundry and other storage rooms. He also found a wine cellar that was empty. The basement was a large space, and he had an idea of how he was going to use it.

Storm blinked to his treasure cavern in Iron Hills and filled a big bag with the energy crystals. He also collected many other items into a big pile. He blinked home to kiss Lindell and rubbed her big belly. He then collected Kim, Wally and Walter.

They helped him pick out up the items he wanted, and Storm dropped them off at the hotel with a brief explanation of what he wanted to do. The boys got started while he went to get the others. They loved refurbishment projects.

Storm collected his new wizards and even asked Olivia if she was free. She happily joined him, curious at what he was going to do. He introduced them all and explained what he wanted them to all to do. He had them in the back garden where they were unobserved from the streets.

He got them to link together in a line in the order of DT, Wally, KJ and Walter in the first group. Daniel, Zarka, Payton and he were in the second group and Sarah, Ashley, Kim and Olivia for the third. He assigned them tasks and then they started renovating.

In their minds, they all saw the building as a massive set of individual blocks and overlaid was Storms image of what it was to look like when they finished their task. They all got seriously involved in the project.

Storm had put Wally’s team in charge of plumbing and fixing the bathrooms. Kim’s team directed the shifting of inner walls and refurbishing of them. Then they shifted to the exterior building repairs. Storm’s team did the electrical wiring, the fixtures, built the lift and redid the kitchen.

Wally’s team then switched to furniture repairs and cupboards, while Kim’s team covered flooring and painting and Storm’s team fixed the carriage house and the roadway.

Payton decided to smooth out the gardens and encouraged the grass to grow. They also covered any other little things Storm decided they required or they had suggested to him that he agreed was reasonable.

He was bloody glad that he had a big bag of charged crystals to draw from, as he was able to distribute the energy to the others to keep them magically charged. He wondered if he should keep them with him more often.

The people walking past on the two streets that met at the corner of the building that afternoon noticed it seemed blurred and stopped to look at. As they gathered and watched, the building appeared to solidify from the ground up.

The building had a golden glow, and the windows shone with cleanliness. The steps into the building and the front doors took on a new fresh look. A long wide gold and white striped awning appeared over the double doorway, and shorter ones materialised over the windows.

Then the second floor appeared with similar awnings over the windows and then the third and then the top level. Some of the observers were blinking and rubbing their eyes. They were trying to work out, what the hell was happening. Then the lights came on.

The wizards heard the collective gasp from the street and the sudden babble of many excited voices. “Oops!” said Storm and the others all chuckled.

They walked in the back door and checked out their handiwork to see what they had missed. The group found that they all did little tweaks here and there. Storm rearranged a couple of the lights, and the boys checked that their plumbing worked.

While they were walking around checking the rooms, Zarka was the first to notice the other fixture that Storm hadn’t mentioned and grinned when she saw the replication screens, recycle hoppers and collection cubicles in the kitchen and on each floor.

Storm smiled at her, “Hope you don’t mind, but I borrowed your library and added it to Sarah’s. I’ve had a quick look at the local fashions, and I think that between the different sets of data, we can find plenty of outfits to pick from.”

“I also added some of the data from the files that Sean sent with Raina for me. However, you ladies are more than welcome to go shopping tomorrow. I’m sure Olivia would love to show you around the City.”