A Reign of Steel by Morgan Rice Page B

your demons. On how you perceive yourself.
How you perceive the world. And most of all, on how deeply you can control your
mind. Can you shut out a dark thought? Can you give power to a positive one?”
    Thor
took it all in, overwhelmed, trying to understand. He realized something as he
listened to the King’s words.
    “You,”
Thor said, “you are a reflection of my mind.”
    MacGil
nodded back, smiling.
    “You
loved me,” he said. “I was an important person to you. A mentor of sorts.”
    “When
I leave this place, you’ll be gone,” Thor said, beginning to understand, and
saddened at the thought.
    MacGil
nodded.
    “When
you leave— if you ever leave—then yes, the world will go back to as you
know it. But for now, here we are. As real and as alive as we ever were. Your
entire mind, your entire consciousness, is spread out before you. Don’t you
see, Thorgrin,” he said, draping one arm around his shoulder, “this entire land
is a reflection of you . It is an exercise in mind control, Thorgrinson.
Some of your happiest moments, some of your most beautiful memories, will
appear before you on your journey. Though I must warn you: do not let your dark
thoughts overwhelm you, even for an instant. Dark thoughts pass through the
Land of the Druids like fierce storms. If you do not learn to control them,
they will destroy you.”
    Thor
gulped, nervous, beginning to understand.
    “So
that town I past,” Thor realized, “my hometown. I created that. My mind created
that.”
    MacGil
nodded.
    “It
was an important place in your life. It was the place you wanted to welcome
you.”
    Thor
realized something else.
    “And
then that field of flowers I walked through,” he said, “it was indeed where I
first dated Gwendolyn. And that white snake I saw…”
    Thor
trailed off, piecing it all together. It was beginning to make sense. Finally,
he was understanding. This place was more powerful than he’d realized. More amazing,
more promising, than he’d ever dreamed. And yet also more terrifying.
    They
walked for a long while in silence, until something occurred to Thor.
    “And
my mother?” he asked. “Is she alive? Is she a real person? Or just a figment of
my hope and imagination? Is she here only because she exists somewhere deep in
my subconscious? Only because I always wanted her to exist? Only because I
needed her to exist? Only because I dreamed of having a glorious parent?”
    King
MacGil was silent, expressionless, as they walked.
    “You
seek absolute answers,” he said. “In the Land of the Druids, you will find
there are no absolutes. The only answers you’ll find are within yourself. However
powerful you are inside, that is how powerful this world will be before you.
Prepare yourself, young Thorgrin, and steel yourself to control the hardest,
greatest, most unwieldy weapon of all: your mind.”
    *
    Thor
traversed the Land of the Druids for hours, MacGil by his side. The two of them
had been laughing and bantering for hours, reminiscing about the old times,
about the hunts they had taken together, about King’s Court, about when Thor
had first met the King’s daughter. They talked about MacGil’s accepting him into
his family; they talked about battle, and knights, and honor, and valor. They
talked about King MacGil’s assassin, and the vengeance that had been taken.
They talked of politics. But mostly they talked of battle. They were both
fearless warriors at their heart, and they understood each other on a deep
level. In some ways, Thor felt as if he were here talking to himself. It felt
so good to be talking to King MacGil again, to have him back at his side. Thor
felt a sense of a break from reality, as if he were wandering in a surreal land,
in a dream from which there was no waking up.
    They
passed through vistas that Thor recognized with delight, places that felt so
familiar, places from his hometown, from his countryside, from outside King’s
Court. He felt so comfortable here. A part of