CHAPTER 1

Raised voices echoed up the stairwell as Lopt cracked open the door of his room. The hardwood floors were chilly under his bare feet as he quietly made his way down towards the foyer where his father stood arguing with someone on the porch. The breeze blowing in through the open front door carried the scents of dogwood, heralding the arrival of spring in the South.

"We've come for the Ring," a familiar man's voice said firmly.

His father shook his head vehemently, even as Lopt froze, out of sight of the visitors behind the solid oak door. The old man's dark brown eyes nevre turned towards the older of his sons, but Lopt knew his father was aware of his presence.

"I don't know what ring you're talking about, Dalant." His father's voice was defiant, but even Lopt could detect the uncertain waver in the inflection. "And seeing who you've chosen to associate with since you renounced your apprenticeship, I wouldn't give you so much as ring around the collar."

"Funny, Loren. Very funny." Dalant's voice held no trace of amusement. "I know you have the Ring of Cadrom, however."

Lopt sensed the buildup of energy only an instant before both Dalant and his father fired off their spells. The resultant thunderclap knocked him backwards, up the stairs, and left him sprawled on the landing. The enchantments he'd worked so hard to perfect paid off and protected him from any serious harm, and he bounded to his feet in time to see three robed figures barging into the house.

His father knelt at the end of the hallway, not moving as the three acolytes charged him. Just before the first reached the kneeling figure, however, a shimmering blue bubble of energy expanded around the old man, pushing the intruders away and back out the front door.

Unsurprised to see a smaller force field appear around himself, Lopt hurried down to join his father, taking the steps three at a time.

"Ah, there you are." Dalant smiled in his direction as they locked gazes. The mageus wore the heavily embroidered robes of a full Force Mage, a promotion from the simple Energy Mage he'd been the last time Lopt had seen him. "I wondered if you'd be around." The Circle of Thorns magus tested the force field now blocking the door with a simple spell, his smirk never wavering.

"Get out of here, Dalant," Lopt's father intoned as two of the three lower-ranking Thorns slowly returned to their feet.

"You think your son will stop me?" Dalant's lip twitched into a wider smirk.

Loren shook his head. "You always were careless. I suppose I was a fool to think I could work it out of you."

Lopt looked from his father to the man on their doorstep, his fists clenching with the urge to put an end to this. A subtle pulse of magic seemed to flow along the currents of Loren's words, however, and he held back to see what his father had planned.

A sudden blast of green fire from behind Dalant answered the question as one of the Force Mage's accomplices detonated his infamous 'kamikaze' spell. The heat and shock penetrated through Loren's force fields, but Lopt was more surprised than harmed.

Not so the Circle mages on the step. Two of Dalant's henchmen lay on the brick steps, one unconscious from the effort of the spell and the other apparently knocked senseless by the blast. The third mage, a woman, frantically beat at the flames consuming her robe while Dalant snarled.

The Force Mage touched a slash on his cheek from which blood now trickled freely. "That was a mistake, Loren, on both our parts. I should have remembered your talents at mental manipulation."

There was nothing subtle in the patterns of the magical field around Dalant, but the speed at which the Circle mystic cast his spell caught Lopt totally by surprise. The blast from Dalant's hands caught him squarely in the midsection, hurling him backwards through the doorway to the basement and down the stairwell.

Stars danced in Lopt's vision as his temple smashed against the concrete floor, combining with a vicious snap and wave of pain from his left leg to threaten him with unconsciousness. As he pulled himself to his knees, however, his father's unmoving body lying next to him told him that the older man had fared even more poorly. Another blast shot down the stairwell, scorching the arm he'd put out to check for a pulse.

"Leave him alone, Dalant!" A red haze danced across Lopt's vision as he stared at the man who had once been his fellow student and friend. The Force Mage had descended a few steps down from the main floor, the smirk still firmly in place.

"Why Lopt, one might think you actually cared for the old fool. I'd ask you to show me where the ring is, but I have a feeling you’d come over all noble and refuse. Instead, I'll just…"

Another pulse of magic, this one even stronger than the last warned Lopt of Dalant's intent, but his leg collapsed beneath his weight as he tried to dodge out of the way. The blast stuck him full on, a fireworks display of reds and blues that dissolved into inky blackness as he slipped away from conscious thought.