The Fire and The Storm - The Nexus of Kellaran #2
Chapter 141

Part 21

Mark could no longer be seen in the maelstrom he was creating. Within seconds, even the blazing light of his spells was blocked in the storm of flying shattered rock and clouds of dust he was blasting out of the mountain he faced.

Talia hurriedly cast to protect the reflector and the research facility on it's north rim from damage from flying rocks and boulders. The facility's blast protections had automatically activated, but would soon have been overwhelmed. It was more than Talia could deal with alone, and a second later those with her joined her efforts, then Val cast an automated, self-powered spell that relieved them of the task. Any unprotected living thing within twenty kilometers would certainly have been killed, but nothing visible lived there.

"Have you noticed that we're almost in the focus of the reflector, and we're not getting any extra power from it?" Val absentmindedly asked as she watched the destruction-storm with captive fascination. "Father's got his collection field over this entire area, fifty kilometers wide, and no warlock power is getting through it at all. I had to cast that automated spell with pure wizard's power, or it would've drained my warlock power pretty fast."

"He needs to vent his anger, and I can't blame him." Alilia angrily stated. "I don't know what the hell the poor boy is going to do about this. Damn it, we're supposed to be getting married in four hours!" "We are getting married in four hours!" Talia stated with fierce determination as she gave Alilia a sudden firm hug. "Nothing is going to change that, and nothing could diminish our love for you!"

"Damn, are my insecurities so very transparent?" Alilia bitterly asked as she returned Talia's embrace.

"Only to me, dear love." Talia assured her.

"Is he going to be all right in there?" Kragorram worriedly asked.

"He has all his Shields and Pure Breath running." Fire observed. "He should be okay."

"I know, but that mountain is a dormant volcano after all, and barely dormant at that. It's most recent eruption was only two centuries ago. If he keeps going like that, he'll break through into the lava at the core of the mountain. It may be under incredible pressure, and he may break through suddenly, which would cause a cataclysmic explosive eruption aimed directly at him, and at us."

A second later Talia reported; "I warned him of the possibility, but he's still too angry to care."

"We should prepare to act to contain the eruption enough to protect him, us, the reflector, and the facility." Povon decisively stated, then Linked with Somonik and demanded; "Give me the Command Link and our available power now!"

"Done!" Somonik responded almost instantly.

The eight over Focus Mountain were already Linked with Povon when she felt control of the Command Link come to her, and they were aware of the minds and power of the two and a half million military spell- casters who were on stand-by duty at the moment. Hundreds of thousands more were joining every second, then millions.

"That's enough, thank you." Kragorram reported as he and Six analyzed the volcano and what Mark was doing to it.

But Mark was also aware of what they were finding, and he forced control upon himself before he reached the lava. Relative silence fell, broken only by the reports of still falling rocks and boulders, as he floated there in his sphere of Shielding, still shaking with anger. Then he expanded his awareness for kilometers all around and identified all the material he'd blasted out of the mountain, seized it all with Movement, and began crushing it back into the crater he'd made with astounding force while heating it enough with Fire to fuse it into place. He did this repair with a manic violence equal to his destruction, and he resumed his great roaring scream of rage while he did so. Again sight of him was lost amidst an inferno of his creation.

His anger was finally spent just before his repair was done, but he still heated and forced the last of the rock into place with grim determination.

Then he joined them above the reflector. There was silence for a long moment as they considered his grim countenance and realized that he was keeping his thoughts to himself, while he considered their concerned expressions.

"I've gotta think this out for a minute." he told them as gently as he could, obviously still struggling for self-control. He made a seat of Force and sat down in mid-air, rested his elbows on his knees, and put his head in his hands.

Talia and Alilia moved to sit and embrace him from either side, but they remained silent, letting him think.

"Somonik, Battle Wizards of The Just Alliance, thank you for your almost instant response." Povon said over the Command Link. "Your readiness does you proud. However, it seems this was a false alarm. It seems we will not need your assistance to deal with the consequences of our Key's temper tantrum. As alarming as it was, it appears he was quite in control of himself, and he has repaired all damage to his firing range. Again, thank you."

"I am relinquishing control of the command Link."

"On all of our behalf, you are all most welcome." Somonik chuckled over the Link. "We might have trusted Mark's self control, but we did not begrudge you the precaution. As you said, it was an alarming demonstration of destruction, and a demonstration of repair that was almost as alarming. We will study our Reading of the event in order to more fully understand and quantify his abilities and those of warlocks in general. This study may be of greater importance now, since it seems there may soon be many more warlocks.

"We have not had a genuine emergency call to duty since the war ended, so this was a valuable exercise, and we thank you. Our response time has not diminished much, and that is good to know." Povon shared his mental chuckle, then closed the Link.

After almost six minutes Mark sat up straight and looked around at all of them. "It seems I've got two choices. We could move us all with all forty-three of the girls and their kids into our biggest place and just all live together like one big happy family. But I sure wouldn't be able to give each of my children the time and attention they deserve.

"The other choice is to raise each child one at a time in a series of time-bubbles. We'd go into a little time-bubble with the first girl and be a family with her and her child until the child is grown, then come out of the time-bubble and cast another for the next girl, and so on. There's no way I'll ever be able to give all my adult children the time they deserve, but at least this way I can give it to them when they're kids, wher they really need it.

"We want to find a way to get enough time compression so that we can do it all over the span of one pregnancy, so we finish raising the second-last child just before the last one is born."

There was silence for a bit as the rest considered that.

Talia made her decision, and gave her opinion. "Then that's what we have to do, because it seems to me that it would be neglect to try to raise that many at once. I know you couldn't consider just adopting them out and washing your hands of them, you need to raise and love every one of your own children.

"The girls of The Volunteers are all fine people, and they'll be easy to love, especially since they already love you, and you love us so you can't just give us up while you raise children with them, so we'll be helping them raise their children as co-mothers."

"I agree." Alilia nodded. "And for an area only large enough to contain a healthy environment for a single family, we can use reverse-stasis fields rather than time-bubbles. We can cast those ourselves, without needing the help of the gods, so we'll have complete control over ending them or communicating with the outside world if we have to. And they'll give us a much greater time compression than the time- bubbles. We could be done raising all the children long before the Hiliani time-bubble is scheduled to end."☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐

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