Birthright-The Technomage Archive Read Online Free Page A

sword against his leg, but the red-purple fire around its blade didn’t seem to singe his robe at all.
    That was exactly the way Gramps described the sword he had found. Ceril swallowed again, but didn’t dare to blink.
    The large man with the Flameblade screamed something unintelligible at the man behind the camera, who then turned and ran. The next few seconds of video were hectic and unfocused. Then there was a crash, and the camera fell to the ground, focusing sideways on a tree. A booted foot stepped into frame, and the bald man’s face appeared soon after as he crouched to peer into the lens.
    He said, “Your generation has tried to hide the past for too long, and the time has come to make things right. The Untouchable will no longer allow you to feed the world the scraps of your technology.” He held up the glowing sword. “You technomages will either remove yourselves from the shadows and put Erlon back on the path toward its destiny, or we will pull you out and put it there ourselves.”
    The face moved out of frame, followed by the boot. There were a few seconds of silence and then a whuffing sound off screen that ended with a pop . The video ended, and the hologram returned to the woman who had introduced the horrifying clip. Swarley paused the holovid before the woman could begin her commentary.
    “ Hey!” Ceril said. “What was she saying?”
    “ About how horrible it all was, and that no one knows what’s going on. It doesn’t matter,” said Swarley.
    “ Then what does?” Ceril yelled. “Why did you show me that?”
    “ Because it’s all that anyone has talked about for the last month, Ceril. I knew it was going to be tough at Ennd’s this year because of the technomage rumors these terrorists stirred up—did you know my parents almost wouldn’t let me come back?”
    “ No,” said Ceril. “How could I? I’m glad they let you.”
    “ Me, too. I just never expected you to come in claiming to be a technomage after this!” He waved his hand at the area of the room where the hologram of the woman still floated.
    “ I never claimed to be a technomage!”
    “ But you said you had one of their swords, which might as well be the same thing. It sounds a little too close to the weapons those people used to kill all those kids, man.”
    Ceril was silent. He leaned against the wall and banged his head lightly against it over and over. “Yeah,” he finally said. “It sure does.”
    “ Did yours glow like that?”
    “ No,” said Ceril, perhaps too quickly.
    “ What about the rest of it? The color of the metal, the sword itself, you know?”
    Ceril thought back to the garden. He could see the gold blade glinting in the sunlight as though it were in front of him. “It looked just like the ones in the vid,” he said.
    “ So. This sword, this Flameblade of yours. Where is it?” Swarley asked. His voice was even, without inflection. Ceril thought Swarley sounded a little more menacing than he had ever heard him.
    “ Gramps kept it. Said he might contact a museum about displaying it,” Ceril said.
    “ Right,” Swarley said. “And you said he didn’t know about this attack at all?”
    Ceril shook his head. “How could he? You know how he feels about the ‘Nets.”
    “ Okay. Well, at least you didn’t bring it here. The sword, I mean.”
    “ He wouldn’t let me.”
    “ Smart man,” Swarley said. He just stared at Ceril with his lips pursed.
    “ What?”
    “ I dunno. I’m just saying all of this kind of weirds me out.”
    “ Yeah. It does me, too,” Ceril said and closed his eyes. “I’m not a terrorist, though. I’m not a killer.”
    After a small pause that Ceril might have imagined, Swarley said, “I know.”
    “ Neither is Gramps.”
    “ I know that, too, Ceril. Of course, I know that. But no one else here does. And after that—” he gestured again to the hologram floating above the desk, “you really shouldn’t mention the Charons, the technomages, or that sword