Chapter 10: Enlistment

I have become used to surprising people, Jake mused as he stepped from the Portal. The gaping jaws and shocked features of Barrachus and the two ceremonial guards didn't faze him in the least. He just smiled like a Cheshire Cat. "Hello, Barrachus. Hello,... I'm sorry, what're your names?" he asked of the two Guardians.

"I- I'm Rechart, and this is William. What are you doing out so quickly? It should be at least a day before you leave the Chamber of Broken Souls!" The man was clearly unnerved by Jake's ambitious egress, but Jake just held his grin.

"Well, Rechart, William, today is your lucky day. I am making you a one-time offer to become my... hmm, I guess liegemen might be the word for it. If you choose to swear your loyalty to me, I will give you power and abilities beyond that which you already possess as Adepts. With these powers, you will further my own designs to their ultimate conclusion. What do you say?" Jake had decided that he would need reinforcements, and here was as good a place as any to start recruiting

Once again Jake had shocked them into speechlessness. Disbelievingly, they turned towards Barrachus. "Barrachus? Can he do what he says he can?" Rechart asked seriously, if a little incredulous.

Barrachus drew in a long, slow breath. "I... think... that he can. However, I would counsel you that if you choose to swear loyalty to him, you may find yourself at some point in the future at odds with the Council and the Circle. What he offers is not a gift, but a payment." Jake nodded, acknowledging the truth of his words. Rechart and William looked at each other, considering. Jake was elated. They were going for it!

Abruptly, Rechart nodded decisively. He knelt to one knee and said, "I agree to serve you and your cause in exchange for greater power." William hesitated only a second, then sighing pensively, knelt and spoke the same words.

Jake reached out and touched their foreheads, sending his awareness coursing through their bodies. Having already figured out what to do, it was a relatively simple matter to find the marks of the "initiation ritual" in their minds, that barely tangible link with the Ether that Ykir had made millennia ago, and rip it out, leaving in its place a much more fluid conduit, and tying its link to their conscious minds through their sworn loyalty. That way, if they defied him, they lost their power and became relatively harmless. As an added bonus, he thought of a way to take fifty years off their biological ages, making them look and feel like twenty-five-year-old men.

The elapsed time it took to perform these changes was virtually nonexistent. As the power flowed through Jake's fingertips into the two guards, the room flared to brightness and then quickly died away, leaving Barrachus staring in awe at the two young men before him. The look in their eyes was no less amazed as they scrambled to their feet.

"I... can... feel it. It's like a cool flame I can reach out and touch, mold like putty in my hands! It's incredible!" Rechart whispered.

"'Incredible' doesn't begin to describe it, Rechart." William stated matter- of-factly, his voice as reverently subdued as his partner's. "It's like owning a little piece of Ether!"

"That's almost exactly what it is, gentlemen. You two are the world's first Elemental Mages. I have given you direct control over a small amount of Ether. It would put you on an equal footing with a Dreck, and it should certainly be enough to handle a Seer or two." His two liegemen's eyes widened at that implication. "Remember your oath of loyalty. Should you betray or defy me, your powers will disappear as if they never were. You are no longer Adepts, so even those paths of power will be closed to you." The two men nodded as one.