Mantle: The Return of the Sha by Gary Bregar Read Free Book Online

soul. And although they would appear as though they were wholesome and decent Fories, they would carry evil within them, hidden from notice.
    But a strange thing happened. Barth’s children became very loving and caring Fories. They inherited none of their father’s dark curse. Likewise, none of their children did either. And so it appeared as though the curse either never took effect because of the good nature of Barth himself, or was not properly administered by the Skites to begin with. Barth never knew that he had been cursed at all; otherwise, he would never have allowed his children to enter the world in the first place. But he did not know of such things and mistakenly accounted for his escape as skill and training on his part—not the elaborate hoax that it truly was.
    Since Barth was regarded as a hero once the war was won, he and his descendants became a prominent and noble family highly regarded by the Fories, as well as each of the monarchs that ruled over the years. Although the status that Barth had won had been long forgotten, his descendants continued to live with a good reputation. It was not unusual for a reigning monarch to appoint members of the Touro family to such highly regarded positions as royal ambassadors or councillors.
    Tate Touro himself had been offered an appointment as ambassador to the Sovereign Trees by the newly crowned King Zander—just as Tate’s father had been offered the appointment by King Alexo before him. It was a top position that he reluctantly turned down in order to spend more time at home with Doalie to focus on producing children of their own.
    Since declining the king’s offer to become ambassador, he was quickly nominated by the village council to become mayorgovern of the village of Maske. Mayorgovern was a much lower position, but Tate accepted the nomination and was unopposed in the subsequent election of the village council.
     
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    Having children turned out to be a challenge, though. Doalie did not become pregnant as expected, and as time went by they both grew to resent one another, each blaming their childless misfortune on the other. They became so disenchanted with each other that, when Doalie finally became pregnant, they were both lost in deep anger and sadness. They never showed it, however, and perhaps they didn’t even suspect their own bitterness themselves. But it was there just beneath the surface all the same.
    The oracle, having foreseen that a child of Tate and Doalie might be different from the other Touros of the past, felt it necessary to issue a warning to Tate not to have children. Tate was so distraught with the advice that he kept the secret to himself, never speaking a word of it to anyone—least of all his wife. Not only did he desire children in order to carry on his name, he also knew that his wife wanted children desperately. He reasoned that, while the oracle was to be taken seriously, he was not infallible and could be wrong in his prediction.
    So when Doalie finally became pregnant, they celebrated. And when she bore the child and they had named him Balki, they celebrated once again.
    Although he thought of the oracle’s warning often in the beginning, as time went by Tate forced himself to forget what he had said. He saw no signs that his son was evil in any way. In fact, he was one of the kindest young men in the village, always eager to assist others and often engaged in local affairs. It seemed clear that he would follow in his father’s footsteps one day to become a great leader of Forris.
     
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    At a young age, Balki exhibited all of the gifts of his father. He was a very skilled watercall and had the gifts of both Bird-speak and Animal-speak. He even carried some skill in windmaking, which was something he had inherited from his great-great-grandfather. Gifts of magic were generally inherited, so it was no surprise that he would garner some magic from older ancestors.
    What was not known, however, was that