The Academy Read online

  Lost Tales of Power: Volume II

  The Academy

  Second Edition

  Written and Published by Vincent Trigili

  Copyright 2010 Vincent Trigili

  Cover Art by Lynz (mailto:[email protected])

  Edited by Kristi Trigili and

  Elaine Kennedy ([email protected])

  ISBN: 978-1-4580-8252-7

  Visit the Lost Tales of Power official homepage:

  http://www.losttalesofpower.com

  Tales of Power official Twitter feed:

  @VincentTrigili

  EBook Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This ebook is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Introduction

  The Lost Tales of Power is a collection of novels that describe an immense persistent multiverse. The books are a mixture of standalone and miniseries all set in the same universe with overlapping and intertwining storylines. While the books are a mixture of classic science fiction and pure fantasy, some effort is being made to keep the books in the realm of the possible, or at least theoretically possible given some basic assumptions.

  Lost Tales of Power Series:

  Volume I - The Enemy of an Enemy

  Volume II - The Academy

  Volume III - Rise of Shadows

  Volume IV - Resurgence of Ancient Darkness

  Volume V - The Sac’a’rith

  Volume VI - Spectra’s Gambit

  Volume VII – The Sac’a’rith: Rebirth

  Volume VIII and beyond - TBA

  To be informed when new books are released:

  Visit our website: http://losttalesofpower.com

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  Sign up for Email notices via: http://smarturl.it/LostEmail

  Join us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/LostTales/

  I hope you find as much enjoyment in reading these stories as I had living them. If you enjoy the books, please post a review and spread the word about them. As an independent author, word of mouth is the only marketing I can afford. Thanks!

  Time Line So Far:

  IE = Imperial Era (similar to BC, counts backwards)

  EM = Era of Magic

  12/01/01 IE – Enemy of an Enemy starts

  01/20/02 EM – Enemy of an Enemy ends

  02/01/02 EM – The Academy starts

  08/30/42 EM – The Academy ends

  05/15/55 EM – Rise of Shadows starts

  12/30/58 EM – Rise of Shadows ends

  01/31/59 EM – Resurgence of Ancient Darkness starts

  03/15/59 EM – The Sac’a’rith starts

  08/11/62 EM – Spectra’s Gambit starts

  10/31/62 EM – The Sac’a’rith ends

  01/25/63 EM – Resurgence of Ancient Darkness ends

  02/01/64 EM – Sac’a’rith: Rebirth starts

  08/25/64 EM – Sac’a’rith: Rebirth ends

  01/01/65 EM – Spectra’s Gambit ends

  Prologue

  Alarms were going off all around me as I gripped my dual phase pistols and made a break for the bridge. The enemy had boarded our ship and they were hunting us down, killing us left and right. All around me I could hear the echoes of my fellow shipmates screaming for mercy. The ship smelled like burnt flesh and was filled with thick, black smoke.

  I had to get to the bridge; I had to reach my station. I sprinted down the hall, dimly illuminated by emergency lights. The ship was in low power mode due to all the damage we had sustained. Our craft, the Crusader, was the smallest command ship of the assembled fleets and was not faring well under the constant assault, and now those monsters had boarded us. I did not even have the language to name such vile creatures.

  I was making for the maintenance shaft at the end of hall three, which would take me up to the bridge on deck fifteen. Turning the corner, I came upon one of those creatures. It was like some mad scientist’s hybrid of multiple kinds of insect. Its massive claws easily tore through and ripped down the door between us and it charged at me.

  Without conscious thought, I fired both my weapons over and over at the creature. It screamed: a bone-chilling, soul-wrenching sound that I wish I could forget. I continued to fire my weapons as fast as I could, not daring to pause even to change directions and run. It was enough to force the creature to retreat, but I was sure I had not seriously hurt it.

  I did not wait for its return; instead I sprinted with all my strength down the corridor. I had to reach the bridge; everything depended on it. I tried not to notice the mangled remains of my fellow shipmates as I made my run. The smoke and stench made my eyes sting, and my gut was twisting up inside me wanting desperately to jump out through my throat.

  On the floor in the corridor I found some abandoned weapons, more powerful than my phase pistols. I tried not to think about the person who had used them prior to me and instead focused on the upgrade in my firepower. I holstered both of my pistols and grabbed a rapid-fire pulse rifle from among the weapons as I continued my mad rush to the maintenance shaft.

  As I turned the final corner I saw the entrance. I screamed in shock as I kicked open the hatch and leaped into the shaft: the ladder was white-hot, so that even through my armored gloves I could feel the heat. I tossed my rifle over my shoulder and climbed the ladder faster than I had ever climbed before, determined not to let a little discomfort keep me from my goal.

  Somehow I made it up that shaft and rolled out into the corridor. It was a straight run from there to the bridge. I just needed to keep my head and focus on the goal. I can do this, I thought to myself. I had started down the hall when one of those creatures burst through a wall and charged me.

  I did not stop my run. Letting loose a primeval yell, I fired my rifle as fast as I could and blasted my way right through its disgusting body. Then another came and another, and soon they were coming from everywhere. I fired my rifle until it was drained and then used it as a club, still trying to make it to the bridge. All around me I could hear people screaming: “James! Please don’t kill us!” and “James, you are our only hope, save us!”

  I tried to push on to the bridge, but the creatures kept coming; then one reached me and …

  I sat up in bed, dripping with sweat but freezing cold. I looked around and slowly recognized my old bedroom in my parents’ home. I tried to shake the image from my mind and remind myself that I had not even been aboard the Crusader, and nothing I could have done would have saved her that day.

  After some time, I got up and headed to my desk, knowing there would be no more sleep for me this night. There was plenty of work to do, and I desperately needed to get my mind off the Crusader. I told myself again that there was nothing I could have done to save her, but that did not quell the screams in my head.

  Looking at the discharge paperwork on my desk, I felt a spasm in my gut. I had spent my entire life so far in the Imperial Navy, given it everything I had. I was decorated for honorable and courageous service a dozen times. I had survived a major war with the worst enemy ever conceived of in all our known history, and yet I was quitting.

  How could I continue, though? I could not even sleep through the night
without hearing the screams of the dying. I had failed the Crusader and her crew. On a ship her size, the crew complement was in the tens of thousands. All of them had families and friends; all of them were lost because I failed. I wondered how many of them had been at the end of their tour and ready to go home. How many had signed up expecting to serve out a full term until they retired around their fourth century of service? Yet because of me, with far less than a quarter of a century in the Navy, they would not serve even one more day.

  I had planned to serve another term there, but I just could not do it any longer. My family had no idea why I had come home; I had told them only that I was on leave when I arrived home unannounced. My father was his normal self, completely out of sorts on account of my surprise arrival; but Mom had calmed him down in time for a late dinner.

  My current term of service was up, and resigning now meant I would get a full honorable discharge as a distinguished war veteran. Leaving the Navy meant leaving everything I knew, changing my entire life, but it would allow me to move on from that horrible experience. Yet it felt like a coward’s move, running from my fears instead of facing them.

  No, I am not a coward, I had to remind myself as I looked at the other paper on my desk, an application form; not just any application, but an application to the one place where I could gain the necessary skills so that I would never again be forced to let good people fall victim to such horrible creatures.

  As I completed my discharge paperwork and placed it and the application in the outgoing mail queue, I wondered briefly what my new future would hold. Would my application even be looked at by anyone who mattered? Would they just laugh at it, or would I be seriously considered? The odds were so far against me it was hard to even pretend to myself that I had a chance.

  Chapter One

  Everyone had told me not to bother applying for entrance into the school, because almost everyone who applied was rejected without explanation. According to the figures recently released by the school, several million people apply every year and only one thousand are accepted. Of that one thousand, less than a hundred of them were likely to complete the first level of the school; and for most students that took at least ten years, rising to fifteen in some cases. Data had not yet been released on how many applicants were actually gifted with the ability to use magic, nor was it explained how they could possibly know that from the application forms.

  It was also unusual for someone like me to apply because I came from a long line of Navy men and women. It was generally assumed that anyone born into our family would dedicate their life to the Navy, but that was all before The Great War between sorcerers and wizards: the war that spilled over into our realm. After that, everything had changed.

  For the first time in recent history, the stability of the Empire was threatened not by any external forces but by internal rebellion. As tales spread throughout the realm describing the battles between wizards and sorcerers, it shook people’s faith in the Emperor and marked the beginning of the end of worshiping him as a god. Open rebellion and the slow crumbling of naval power marked the years following the war. When it seemed inevitable that the Empire was doomed to be ripped apart by various groups all vying to replace it, promising great things while pledging to destroy anyone who tried to stop them, the Emperor had made an announcement that shocked the realm.

  Like everyone, I know exactly where I was when he made that announcement. I was at my post on the bridge of the still undefeated Dragon Claw. We were on our way to reinforce those protecting the capital planet. The Emperor’s broadcast overrode every channel on every communications station in the entire realm.

  “Attention, good people. Lend me your ear for a brief moment. I come before you not as your god but as a man just like you. Put down your weapons, I beg, and listen for just a moment,” was how he began. The shock of that humble opening was reported to have silenced all weapons and debates everywhere. “Many things have changed in recent years, and the universe we once knew, the rules and beliefs we once held are no longer valid. Therefore I am declaring the end of an era, and henceforth all calendars should be reset so that the day of our victory over the sorcerers marks the beginning of a new era. This entails doing away with many of our old ways, including the archaic notion that I am some kind of deity. I am no god, merely an old man doing his best to keep all of you safe. We need a new system of government, as the previous one can no longer keep the peace in our realm. Let us not forget that we must remain united to defend ourselves. The sorcerers have been pushed back for the present but they are not gone for good, and we still have many old enemies from our own realm who will attempt to take advantage of our inner struggles for their own gain.

  “To bring us back to the united power that we once were, I am dividing the Empire into twenty-five districts based on the standard tax divisions. Each district will be self-governed by a local government of their own choosing, and each district will send two representatives to a united council. This council will be the new ruling body of the realm. In order to realize this goal, I ask all of you to unite in peace under the present laws and protections for a period of five years to allow each district to slowly take local control and choose their representatives to send to the first meeting of the council. At that first meeting we will create a constitution which will be the governing law for all districts that agree to it. The present High Command is already disbanded, and I am creating a diplomatic staff to handle the massive organization and administration that this will entail. As each district becomes ready to regulate themselves, they should contact the capital for more details and information. Thank you for listening, and let us work together to build a greater and better future.”

  With that the fighting ended. Suddenly no one had reason to fight anyone else, as the Emperor had given everyone all they demanded and much more. Over the next few years, while the local governments took control, the big question on everyone’s mind was whether Grandmaster Vydor would join the council. No one had heard much from him since the war, though it was rumored that he and the other wizards had built a large fortress to work from.

  It took over ten years before the first council could meet, and once it did it opened with a screaming match. The Emperor had drawn up a plan for the new government which he seemed to assume would be rubber-stamped, but each district had devised their own scheme which they wanted to follow. After the first day of screaming and shouting, the Emperor announced that Grandmaster Vydor wished to address the new council. While the Emperor had lost his aura of power, Grandmaster Vydor had not: his mere name was known to silence a crowd.

  He appeared floating before the council in his full formal robes. “Honored Representatives of the Empire, why do you attack each other in this way? Why shout each other down? Have you already forgotten the lessons we learned in the war? United you stand in power, divided you fall. Look around these chambers. Everyone here was your brother before we were attacked. Why make them your enemy now? Did we win the war with the sorcerers just for the opportunity to destroy each other?” He paused there. They say not a single member of the council replied to his questions, but all sat in stunned silence. After that he continued: “I suggest you go to your rooms, get some rest, and start again tomorrow as friends; and when you draw up your new plan of government, I ask that you honor the Empire’s pledge to stand with the wizards against our mutual enemy. Now I leave you with this benediction: may the real god of this universe bless you and guide you to create a better future for all the realms.”

  The next day when they met again the tone was much more muted. They had a lot of issues to work out, but they took Grandmaster Vydor’s words to heart and worked together on it. It took them two years to craft and approve the constitution. In the end, only twenty of the twenty-five districts now known as nations pledged to join. It transpired that the Zalionian districts all chose to break off and stand alone under Emperor Zalith; however, they did eventually agree to an alliance with us, which made
everyone breathe a bit easier.

  So it came to be that, two decades after the war, the Navy was to be split up and sections of it given to each district. It was then that I decided to take an early retirement. When my parents finally found out they were gravely disappointed. They had fully expected me to join our new nation’s navy and continue the family tradition until I was too old to serve, perhaps another four centuries or so, but I had other plans. I wanted to go to Grandmaster Vydor’s newly-created school and stand in defense of the realm as a whole instead of just our little nation.

  At first my father did not worry too much about it. He figured I would be rejected just like millions of others were, and then I would do the sensible thing and sign up with the new navy. After all, he had served until his four hundred twenty-fifth birthday, just as his father before him. Three years passed without a word from the school, so I was losing hope when a message finally came from the Academy. I am not sure which of us was the more shocked when we heard that I had been accepted, but that certainly changed his attitude. He grew angry and told me that no son of his would ever turn his back on the navy. My father assured me that if I went through with this, he would remove me from the family. I was unsure how he might go about that, but his reaction was a crushing blow to my excitement. For months I pleaded with him to reconsider, to no avail.

  When the day finally came for me to leave, he called me aside into his private study. I expected him to recommence his attack, but he sat there behind his big, wooden desk just looking at me in silence. That desk always brought back memories of my grandfather, who used to sit there just as my father did in his turn. It had been in the family for many generations, always passed down to the firstborn son. As a child I had dreamed of the day when I would sit behind it, but in the face of my father’s anger I had begun to doubt that the desk would ever pass to me.