Legacy: The Mark of Merlin. Gerald Pruett

carrots, peas and bread. The adults had mead. After eating, Randolph went directly to bed.

       I wasn’t ready for bed. Obviously, since I’m writing. So I wandered and browsed the citadel. According to Randolph I’ve been here once when I was three, but I have no memory of it.

       There are a dozen other kids here. A few of them are even my age. When I came across them playing some game that I wasn’t really familiar with, I watched. When they asked me if I wanted to play the winner, I shook my head and said, “Maybe tomorrow.” My parents, Matthew and Gabrielle were recently killed, and I’ve been on the run for my life for the past few days so I wasn’t in the mood to play games.

       I continued to watch them though. Marlow won four games one after the other before losing the fifth game to Edward. I think it was luck though that Edward beat Marlow because Edward lost the very next game to someone who Marlow had beaten.

       Anyway I had watched a couple more games before I came back here. As soon as I walked in, I saw the volume on the table next to Randolph. I picked it up and read it. And that’s pretty much it. I’ll talk more later, if Randolph lets me.

       Hi, it’s Elizabeth again. It’s Friday morning. Randolph thought that I did okay with last night’s entry so he’s letting me write this entry.

       I would like to say that it was uneventful during the night last night, but last night was anything but uneventful.

       Including Patience there are six seers in the citadel. Patience and three other seers had the same forewarning of the Raven’s attack minutes before the attack had happened. The Raven Coven even had thirteen of its acorn covens involved, a hundred partisans and about twenty wolf-likens. I don’t really know the details of the battle because everyone who was under the age of eighteen was ushered into a large chamber underneath the citadel. In fact, the chamber was built for such attacks on the citadel.

       Anyway, all of us sat quietly and listened to the thunderous sounds that the battle was creating. The chamber walls shook during the loudest strikes followed by dust and small chunks of debris falling down on us.

       The thunder went strong for several hours before dropping off into a calm. For some, the sounds of the thunderous war overhead were more reassuring of our war efforts than waiting the twenty minutes that it took for someone to tell us that it was safe to resurface.

       As we were resurfacing we were ushered through areas of the citadel that were least effected by the battle and into the main assembly room.

       Once we were in that room, some of the kids were pulled away from the main group and spoken to privately. That was five hours ago and we were released from that room thirty minutes ago.

       As I was leaving the room, I found out that those kids were being told the unfortunate news of one or both of their parents being killed in the battle.

       Anyway that’s all I have to say for now. I’ll talk more later, if Randolph will let me again. Bye for now.

      (Patience’s handwriting)

       Randolph had talked me into writing out what I can remember about last night’s battle. My name is Patience, but before I talk about the battle, I would like to explain my ability.

       I’m a seer and a Clover partisan. As early as the age of six, I would get random visions and prophecy dreams of future events that would, more times than not, come to be. When I was thirteen I was taught a ritual that even a partisan seer can do that would help fill in the gaps between my visions. Doing the ritual frequently improves the results, and so I do the ritual nightly and occasionally during the day. Other seers will perform this ritual as well and just as frequently for the same reason.

       Some seers can only see the outcome of a decision once a decision had been made. Other seers are what are known as the ‘Now-seers’.

       ‘Now-seers’ can only see what is presently occurring in the world without actually being there. Two of the seers in the citadel are Now-seers.

       There are other seers (like me) who can see beyond the outcome of a decision. We are capable of seeing all possible conclusions to any possible decisions that a person might make.

       Some seers can determine a day or a time when their visions of the future will occur; unfortunately I’m not one of them. To overcome this I look for certain indications that the vision is growing near or is upon us.

       Last night’s battle for an example. Two weeks ago I saw the battle in a vision within the same vision that Lucas had told me, “Elizabeth is looking more and more like her mom each time I see her.”

       I immediately warned Hanford (the leader of the coven) and Lucas about the coming battle, but I didn’t tell Lucas as to how I would know when it would be upon us. Last night, Lucas had told me what I had been waiting to hear, and that was when I knew that the battle was only minutes away.

       The three seers among us who can also see future events had seen the battle five minutes before Lucas had told me about Elizabeth, so Hanford was being told about it as I was joining them.

       When I confirmed with a nod that tonight was the night, Hanford sounded the alarm.

       As Elizabeth wrote earlier, the children under the age of eighteen were ushered into a large chamber beneath the citadel. The rest of us took our positions for the coming battle. The torches and candles were put out and the only members who were making sounds were the four wizards casting the incantation to cloak us from the Raven’s seers.

       A few of the Raven’s wizards and sorceresses were also casting the same incantation in order to cloak themselves from us, and so we sat patiently while waiting for the members of the Raven Coven to make themselves known.

       One of the Raven’s wizards maneuvered himself unseen to the opposite side of the citadel, and once he was in place, he magically shot fireballs into the wall of the citadel.

       We knew that he was only attempting to draw our fire in the wrong direction, so only one wizard from our side magically fired back.

       In response to our weak retaliation, fireballs came at us from three wizards from yet another direction. Again we knew that this was done only to draw our fire in the wrong direction, so we again gave a weak response.

       Trying to seize the advantage in a battle when both sides have three or more seers is almost impossible, but if you have a good leader, then that leader could take the advantage of a disadvantage. So when the Raven magically fired fireballs from every point, but one, that one point was where Hanford ordered to be heavily fired upon.

       Our first