Danny Kaye's page

Chapter 1 – The Beginning

My name is Justin. Justin Case. And I am a Wizard. (Yes, with a Capital 'W') I'm NOT one of those old fuddy-duddies in old mothball-smelling robes and wide-@$$ pointy hats that make them look like a witch with a beard either. (At least not yet.) I am an Inter-Planar Traveling, Arcane-Energy Wielding, Reality-Bending Engine of Destruction and Creation. Not necessarily in that order.

So, I've decided, after much urging, to go ahead and do this 'Journal' thing. As means to keep a record of my (our) adventures. While I'm still young enough to remember them.

(Or before I fail to continue growing older. Professional Wizard. Occupational hazard.)

This journal will serve as a record, and hopefully provide insight (to myself) of where I am, and how I came to be here. (In the mental and meta-physical sense I mean. I KNOW how I got 'here'. Through a portal.)

Shards and spells. I knew I wasn't any good at this.

<Blot of ink on page where pen was apparently slammed between the pages. There is a brief note in a decidedly feminine handwriting.>

<That's because your starting at the end. Try again.>

So where should I start? Oh. Right. At the Beginning. OK then. Here we go.

My name is Justin. I was born to the Case family in the City of Sumdall in the land of Izmer. Depending upon which Plane of Reality you originate from you may not recognize it. Certainly no one ELSE I have asked in this stinking city has heard of it. (Or won't tell me if they have. NOTHING is free here.) Turns out the Multiverse is larger than anyone could ever have imagined. Who Knew? Right, the beginning.

So the Case Family is a well-to-do family in this part of my world. Politically powerful enough and wealthy enough to make friends, and enemies, but not big enough to be the target of every other rich, politically powerful family in the region. I was the second son. When I got old enough to appreciate it, I decided that this was perfect for me. I was not constantly hounded and brow-beaten at every turn to be turned into the next Head of the Family like my brother James was. I was expected to excel at whatever I did of course, and to eventually marry into another similar family and gain us even more power, prestige, and money. But until then I was pretty much free to do as I pleased, And I did.

Now don't get me wrong. I wasn't a complete @rsehole. I was raised to know the difference between good and bad, right and wrong. Yadda Yadda, But if I'm being honest,

<Note in margin: You had better be!>

, then I must confess that I was also a bit spoiled. Annnd a little bit selfish. Add to that mix I am taller than average, and ruggedly good looking, (If I say so myself) and so I attracted occasional female trouble. (Meaning when it wouldn't find me, I went and found it.) Add to THAT the fact that I am also smarter than the average person. Meaning my tutors couldn't give me enough school-work to keep me out of trouble. (And they tried.) But it turned out I LIKE learning new things. Go figure. SO when I did all of the work they assigned I went and discovered new things to learn. Sometimes it was 'How does the antique water clock work?' Or 'If Father Winter can fit down the grand chimney, why can't I?' And of course, 'How many eggs can my friends and I throw at Old McCranky's Mansion before we have to run from the patrols?' Of course as we got older that led to 'How long can we hold a drunken duel in the middle of the street before we have to run from the patrols?' And my favorite for a long time, 'How many girlfriends CAN I have at once before the others find out?'

<And the answer is?>
<Whose writing this anyway?>
<Carry on.>

SHORT version, I constantly found that I was smart enough to find a way into almost any sort of exciting situation that a youngster could imagine. And that made me popular. Unfortunately, I did not always take the time and effort to figure a way OUT of said situations. Leading to even more exciting situations. Which also made me popular. Just not in a way that my parents approved of.

So I found myself, at the age of 18, in a family meeting. The subject of the meeting? Me. More precisely, what was I going to do with my life? That was going to benefit the family the most? (And embarrass them the least?) It was 'decided' (I got a vote, but not really.) that I would enroll in the Academica Ars Magica. (That's 'Wizard University' in plain Common for you.) I would continue my education under the watchful eyes of the Academica's Instructors, and hopefully learn some self control and maturity. And having a wizard in the family was never considered a bad thing. (Izmer is a Mageocracy.) My parents figured that learning magic would at least keep my 'big brain' occupied. They were at least partially correct on that point, I'll give them that.

So I was given a farewell party, (The Academica was in another city, not just down the road.) Where I received the usual; food, alcohol, a large elaborately decorated cake, nice presents from those that actually cared for my well-being, gag gifts from my youthful friends, and well-wishes from both sides. It was a beautiful and very elaborate 'We love you, but you need to go and get your act together' speech all wrapped up in a ribbon and a bow. And everyone there knew it.

The one shining moment of my party, (Besides the part where I tried to tap dance on the table drunk and nearly stepped in the cake. That was great.) was when my mother gave me her gift. She gave it to me in a brief private moment instead of with everyone else. I just stared at the box for a minute, then at mother. Probably with a really stupid look on my face that at the time I thought made me look 'somber' and 'brooding'. But more likely made me look constipated.

“Open it.” She said gently. With that look on her face that every child knows. The 'Your going to do what I want you do eventually anyway. Why not save yourself a lot of time and trouble and just do it now?' look. So I relented. But I took long enough to make sure she knew that it was MY choice to open it. She just stood there and smiled patiently, waiting for me.

Inside the box was a large pendant on a long, exquisite silver chain. The pendant was silver as well, bearing the family motto on one side. “Strength is Family” written in Draconic. (Because apparently ALL families think they have a dragon ancestor somewhere in the family line?!?) When I turned it over I saw it was my mothers favorite brooch.

A flood of youthful memories all returned at once, vying for dominance. My mother had been the one constant in all of my youth. My Father was great, when he was there. But his business took him away so often and so long that he was more of a visiting dignitary in my house than 'Dad'. As he wasn't home much, he had tried every type of parenting technique known to man when he was. And maybe invented a few of his own. But my mother was always there. It was she, not the hired help, who patched up my childhood scrapes, taught me right from wrong, and read me stories to get me to settle down at night. And she almost always wore this brooch. It was a family heirloom, passed down from mother to daughter for several generations. As I was told the story, it had been a part of a dragon's hoard plundered by a group of adventurers. When the brooch turned out to be non-magical one of the adventurers had taken it and given it to his wife, (apparently raiding a dragon's hoard means you can retire.) Which led to the aforementioned passing it down the family tree.

The face of the brooch, now pendant, was unmistakable. It bore a stylized dragon flying over a castle, all surrounded by a magical circle. The carving had worn over time, but still was unmistakable in its craftsmanship. It had even been adopted as the Unofficially official family crest. Except that our family crest had the dragon in a curving “C” shape. (For 'Case' of course.) While the brooch had the dragon in a serpentine “S” shape. I had always loved that picture. Something about it had always fired my imagination, inspired me. I don't know why. But Mother never had any trouble getting me to behave when I was younger, all she had to do was promise to let me hold the brooch, and I was the perfect child. For a little while anyway. And she had just given it to me.

Part of me briefly wondered if I should be insulted. After all, it was traditionally handed down from mother to daughter. But that brief bout of stupidity was quickly drowned by another flood of memories.

I shook my head slightly, blinking rapidly. Not from tears of course. I looked at my mother and my mouth opened, but no sound came out. I finally managed to croak, “Mother, I ,...”

“I know.” She smiled gently. “Well, don't just stand there. Put it on!” She insisted. With the look.

I relented much more graciously this time, and hung the pendant on my neck.

“Mother, I,...” I repeated. Man was I glad this was a private moment. My reputation for witty repartee would have taken a serious beating otherwise.

“I know Justin. I love you too.” My mother replied, lightly touching the pendant where it hung on my chest.

“Making me proud has never been your problem. Just be good. Be yourself. And I'll be the proudest mother in the world. Just,... do your best to stay out of trouble. And always try to help those that are.” She said softly. Then she straightened up to her full height, (quite a few inches less than mine.) And became the Lady of the House once more. “Now. Get back to the party. You have guests to attend to!” she commanded.

I bowed to my mother with all of the respect that I usually refused to pay anyone.

“As you wish.” I replied with a smirk, quoting my favorite story she used to tell me.

The rest of the party, and the trip to the Academica. remains a drunken blur to this day. Considering my attention span then, and how BORE-ing long carriage rides usually are, That's likely a good thing.

Academica Ars Magica

Said the huge iron sign over the main gates. And several other smaller ones across the extensive campus. As if we were in danger of forgetting where we were at some point during the day.

Despite my original misgivings, and University life in general pretty much anywhere you go, It wasn't really that bad. Turns out that I wasn't the only child from a well-to-do family to be sent to the Academica Ars Magica to learn something besides magic. The school had representatives from all walks of life. From actual royalty, to those who thought they were, or at least acted like it. From well-off families like mine, to those so poor they worked several odd jobs to pay the tuition. You could always identify those students. The always looked tired. Not just during exams. We even had a couple of University janitors who worked day and night, just hoping to be able to learn something hiding in the back of the room while the professor taught the class. All races were represented as well. Humans were the dominant species on campus, but the school practiced the belief that the path of learning was open to all. If they could afford it. So there were many students there that are considered fairy tales in some lands. Elves, Halflings, Gnomes, Dwarves, catfolk, bird-people, and some I still don't know what.

I'm unsure what to write here. I mean, I don't know what parts are more important. Looking back now, I was just so,... If I knew then what I know now,...

Right. Don't skip ahead.

So the first thing I did was discover a group of like-minded students who shared my passion for life, and appreciated my rapier wit. These were my new friends. I was young, good-looking, reasonably well-off from a well respected family, and I had a promising career ahead of me. And as my popularity grew, so did my circle of friends. Those who dared to rival my charm, wit and school scores for some reason were never accepted into my circle. There were rumblings of course, some name calling and such. A few of the more snooty ones dared to publicly accuse me of insulting them and/or their families intentionally.

Absolute rubbish of course. I simply didn't see the need for the competition.

As it turns out, this really WAS one of (if not the single) best school for magical learning in any of the known kingdoms. So while I excelled, naturally, I'm going to swallow my pride and admit that I had to work at it. Going to a school for would-be wizards meant that it was also a school of would-be geniuses. This was great, as it meant that I could finally have conversations with humanoids on my level. Except for the whole no-competition thing I mentioned above. Turns out I had a teensy problem with ego. Who knew?

The professors of the Academica were like you would expect at any institution for learning how to bend the rules of the universe to your whims. Some were great, some were less than great, some were funny, hard, easy, boring, etc etc. And then there were two.

Caldric Greystorm was head of the schools Universalist department, and hands down the schools best instructor on magical strategy. He was old, grey-bearded, gruff-as-a-goat and twice as onry. He didn't make friends, he made wizards. Those who took his classes, and paid attention, might actually survive. (His words, not mine.) He taught that the best spell was the one you never had to cast, because you had done your homework first. He also taught us that the wizard who died with so much as a single cantrip uncast was a Moron. Capitol 'M'. Because he obviously hadn't done his homework.

Yeah, the old goat gave me a headache too. I loved this man.

Caldric taught me that magic is the life blood of the universe. That like everything else there is always a right and a wrong way to use it. And that just because I COULD do something with magic didn't mean that I SHOULD. Caldric also hinted that the universe was far larger than I suspected, and tried to get me to investigate everything that I saw. 'Not a problem' I thought. If I had only understood what he was hinting at. Hindsight is perfect.

But by far my favorite teacher was Althor Shadowlocke. A Sorcerer and head of the schools Conjuration department. I'm pretty sure he was the schools youngest teacher. Ever. He wasn't even 30 yet, (In a field where most of the instructors weren't considered experienced enough to teach until they were pushing 50 at least.) but he was magically powerful, and charismatic, and politically connected, and an excellent lecturer, (never boring!) and his classes were always interesting, and he took a liking to me from the first day of school. Did I mention that he was my favorite teacher?

Althor taught spell strategies too. Like flexibility with a limited spell selection. And creative uses for spells. Both Sorcerer specialties. He said, “Spell choices and planning ahead are all well and good when one has the luxury of an entire tome to choose from every day. But if your choices are limited, then creativity becomes the winner of the battle, not who prepared Fireball instead of a Lightning Strike.” When I mentioned this in one of Caldric's classes, he laughed, (Not kindly) and said, “If your only tool is a hammer, then every obstacle begins to look like a nail.”

For four years, I was having a great time. I had a girlfriend, (ok, girlfriends, but not all at the same time!) I had my circle of friends, I was excelling in my studies, my parents were proud of me. I was on my way to a great future! I had teachers that I liked, and more importantly liked me. While I appreciated both Caldric and Althor, Caldric wasn't really the kind of guy who encouraged students to come over and visit. Althor was. To his favorites.

Althor collected a small group of new students each year that he thought had 'true potential'. To those of us who made that cut, he became our mentor. (All of the professors were required to mentor a certain number of students, but somehow Althor got to be particularly selective. No I didn't think this odd at the time. I thought it was awesome.) He had both political aspirations, and the power and contacts to help him reach those goals. I confess that in me he found a most willing protege'. Soon I had dreams of wielding the power of politics in one hand, and the power of Magic in the other, all while living the good life easily provided to me by both. I'm pretty sure it was all my idea. At first.

Hindsight is perfect. Looking back there were so many clues that I should have seen, so many hints that I should have picked up on. But working myself so hard that I overslept, while not common, wasn't unusual. And I had several weekends that I can't remember due to perfectly normal drinking and debaucherous activities. Losing an extra here and there didn't alarm me. And the occasional nightmare? I was learning to bend the fabric of reality to my personal whims. And just glimpses of other 'common' planes would give a normal person nightmares, so the stuff I was studying it was no surprise that I had the occasional bad dream. Right? I studied, partied, spent time with friends, and girlfriends, made politically savvy friendships and alliances, played pranks on other students, got pranked in return, spent time learning new and powerful Conjuration rituals 'off the books' because they weren't on the schools approved list, and generally had a great time. Until it came to an end.

Okay. I admit that really don't remember much of what happened next. I have managed to find out some information, and I have pieced fragments together until I think I have the basics correct, if not all of the details. Yet. I'll lay it out as I believe it all came to pass.

There's an old saying. 'Power and Politics don't mix'. Turns out that they DO mix. Just not very well. And Althor was no exception. Turns out that he had dreams of power that surpassed anything I could have imagined or suspected. And he was such a swell guy. The sneaky sunuvab!#%$ had tempted, teased, cajoled, charmed, CHARMED, Geased and I don't know what else not merely myself, but his entire stable of hand-picked acolytes into participating in a ritual designed to open a Gate that was never meant to be opened. And not just us. ALL of his previous mentorees were out there too, charming, teaching and otherwise cajoling new and unsuspecting apprentices, students and whoevers into feeding energy into this ritual.

The ritual was a power-gathering conjuration circle. Once every peculiar cycle, I don't know based on what, it didn't match any Lunar, solar or planetary cycle I am aware of, all of the 'inductees' would open a portal and siphon through magical energies. All of the 'outlying' portals were feeding energy into a 'central' portal. Ours. Whether our portal was THE central portal, or just a nexus for a series of feeding branches feeding yet another portal down the line I don't know. Judging by how surprised Althor was at what happened next, I'm guessing he was the big fish in a small pond, and not the head bad guy himself.

What was the purpose? Well you know those things that everyone fears? That everyone has nightmares about? The irrational fear of the monster under the bed? Something in the closet? The tales of creepy tentacle-faced monstrosities that every culture seems to have, no matter how separated they are by culture or geography? Yeah, those. Turns out those were real. Are real. They come from dimensions outside of our usual Planes of reality that everyone (with a wizardly education at least) knows about. I'll just call them 'Outsiders'. Seems that long ago they actually walked our world. All our worlds. Until some do-gooders, either powers, or gods, or heroes, or combination of folk decided that the universe was better off without them and told them to take a hike. And the universe was doing just fine without them until some genius beings, * cough * like Althor * cough * thought it might be fun to invite them BACK to play some more. Yeah, because bringing back beings so terrible that the mere thought of them still drives men to madness eons after they've been gone is SUCH a good idea! So the portal ritual was supposed to help make this terrible idea a reality. Whether the energy being gathered and funneled forward was to wake one of these beings up, or get it's attention like a moth to a flame, or actually provide a stable inter-dimensional passageway for it I'm still not sure. But it was a lot of power. By my estimation we were the central channel point for at least 13 other groups about our size (About 13 give or take) all funneling power into our circle. Yeah, a LOT of power. Whether this would have been just another night of lost sleep, or the beginning of the end of the world, we may never know. Because that's when Caldric came in.

It turns out that Caldric wasn't just some crotchety old goat teaching basic magic principles long after most wizards had expired from one too many magical experiments. He was THE crotchety old goat, the wizard that magic-users who used magic for nefarious purposes feared. Best I can tell he was an agent of a higher authority, or a higher Power, who had suspected Althor's diabolical intentions for a while. Why and how he chose tonight to discover what Althor was up to I do not know. But I'm glad he did.

Caldric and a couple of other professors entered the spell-sealed chamber with no apparent harm from the guardians and spells outside. Caldric calmly ordered Althor to stop what he was doing. Althor declined, in a more fanatical and spittle-throwing manner. Caldric waved his hand and snapped the enchantments and charms around us students with no more effort than opening a door.

(Ok Ok, I don't really know EXACTLY how he did it, but that's the way I imagine it. And I DO know this is the part where I woke back up.)

This is where I come back in. Sort of. I regained consciousness lying on a stone floor of a subterranean chamber with the Mother of Monsters of all Headaches. The first thing I did was retch up whatever was in my stomach. I thought it was from the pain. I figured that I had been to another wild party that I would brag about not remembering. Except that my head never hurt like this after a bender, and from the noise the party was still going on.

“Hey guys, keep it down willya? Wizard trying to die over here.” I managed to croak through a painfully sore throat. Then I looked to see what was making all the racket.

“Whoahatthe,...???” I believe was my semi-coherent response to the view.

What I saw was Caldric and Althor exchanging spell-fire and other arcane energies at each other, with a giant Gate of darkly swirling energies to who-knows-where as a a backdrop. Caldric was calmly and gruffly rebuking Althor's attacks. The elder wizard deflected, absorbed, and blocked blasts of fire, lightning, ice and acid. Once he stopped a direct lightning bolt by what appeared to be his hand and sheer force of will. His counter-attacks were swift and precise, taking advantage of openings left by Althors repetitive spellcasting.

By contrast Althor was screaming epithets as well as spells, his defenses were minimal, all of his focus being on hammering out as much arcane blasts as fast as he could. His basic defenses were slowly but surely being chipped away by Caldric's precise strikes. All things being equal, even my headache fogged brain could tell where this was leading. Unfortunately they weren't the only factors.

The two teachers that had accompanied Caldric into the chamber were engaged in spell-battles of their own with a couple of my fellow students who had not been freed from Althor's mental influences. Or they were willing accomplices. Either way thinking about it now makes my head ache all over again. I tried to call out to my fellow students to stop, but all that came out was a dull croak, easily lost amid the thunderous exchange of spell-blasts.

Then the battle shifted. One of the teachers was wounded by a blast from a student, (A spell the first-year should NOT have known), and Caldric reacted by extending one arm towards the teacher, partially shielding him from the follow up attack. This brief break in Caldric's otherwise perfect defenses caused him to miss the summoning circle that Althor opened behind him. When the hell-fiend came roaring out of the summoning circle it plowed into Caldric with both spiky, ham sized fists, sending the aged wizard flying from the raised entryway and across the chamber. He rolled to a stop almost directly before the swirling gate of purple and black energies. As the hell-spawn turned its attention to the wounded teacher, Althor stepped towards Caldric, who was twitching and trying to rise.

“I'll teach you to meddle in my affairs!” Althor hissed like a villain from a B-grade melodrama. “I've been waiting a long time for this. There won't be enough left of you to identify, much less Raise!” And my favorite teacher raised his arms, strange energies coalescing around his hands, ready to destroy my other favorite teacher in cold blood.

“NO!” I screamed, rising painfully to my knees. Without thinking I used the first spell that came to mind, a lightning strike. I tapped a pin on my robes (a prize from an earlier year) which turned to dust and caused the spell to cast nearly instantaneously. The electrical blast filled the space between myself and Althor. Caught by surprise the blast stunned him. Still covered in tiny electrical discharges he turned towards me. When he saw it was me his eyes widened in surprise.

“Why?” He hissed. “We were going to do great things together?” He seemed truly hurt at this betrayal. Then I saw his fingers were twitching. They were moving in tiny but unmistakable gestures of a spell. I finished mine first. The resulting force-blast must have been enhanced by the proximity of the otherwordly energies from the Gate. Because the resulting blast was much, MUCH more powerful than it should have been, blowing Althor up into the air and sailing in a perfect arc. Right through the Gate. This was apparently the last straw for the abused portal. With energy from outside still being fed into it, and no one to control it, it went full chaotic beserk. Flares of blue, purple, red and black energies flew out of the swirling mass and blasted across the room. The underground chamber began to feel as if it was the epicenter of an earthquake spell.

Knocked flat by the shaking, and still in too much pain to try and stand anyway, I began crawling toward Caldric across the floor as it bucked and heaved beneath me. I couldn't see the other students and teachers, and truth to tell, at that point I didn't much care. All I knew was the two men I respected most in the world had just tried to kill each other, and I had stopped one of them from doing so. And likely killed him. And I didn't know which hurt worse. Maybe more about that later. Maybe.

The noise grew so loud I couldn't hear anything anymore, it grew so bright it was dim and hard to see. I crawled towards Caldric, screaming his name with a voice that couldn't be heard. In a flash of visibility, I saw Caldric's head turned towards me. His face was battered and covered in blood. But his eyes were open and focused. He was looking at me.

“Run boy, Run.” He whispered in a voice that I heard directly in my mind.

“Not without you!” I screamed back silently. He smiled wanly, his head shaking slightly. I couldn't tell if he was telling me no, or if the ground was moving that much. His arm flopped towards me, and I crawled closer. I stretched out and grasped his fingertips.

“Foolish boy.” I heard again in my head, his lips moving only slightly. “Remember what I taught you, and you may live. Good journeys.” And he,... smiled. I swear by whatever power you want me to, in the middle of all that, both the chamber and the Gate collapsing all around us, he SMILED.

Then the Gate exploded. But it wasn't a normal explosion like a fireball. There was light too dark to see, darkness so bright it hurt my eyes, fire that froze, a jumbled kaleidoscope of sights, sounds, and smells. I flailed as I felt myself falling. Up. Caldric's hand was torn from my feeble grasp and I watched as he flew away from me, or I was thrown away from him, or both. I watched him fly into the rainbow whirlpool of the fractured Gate, and I silently screamed once more as I fell into the welcoming blackness of unconsciousness.

And for the second time in a row, I found myself waking up in a strange place.