Mage the Awakening - Seers of the Throne.pdf - Mage - The Awakening - RPG

SEERS

OF THE

THRONE

™

By David Brookshaw, Stephen DiPesa, Alex Scokel,

Malcolm Sheppard, Geoff Skellams and John Snead

Wednesday, 10:27pm, the F3 Freeway, north of

Sydney, Australia

Durriken dropped the BMW back a gear and

planted his foot on the accelerator as he slid into

the left-hand lane. The car screamed as its shot

past the semi-trailer, the truck’s running lights

quickly disappearing into the distance.

“How far do we have to go now?”

Agathon lipped another card onto the book

he had laying in his lap. He stared at it intently

for a second, and then looked up.

“Hard to say. The signs are damn hard to

read right now, although we’re going in the right

direction. The question is, are we going to ind

those Pentacle motherfuckers?”

Durriken glanced into his rearview mirror, and

then slammed the car back into top gear as he

wove between two other cars, screaming across

two lanes of trafic on the freeway. The Beamer’s

headlights lit up the sandstone cliffs beside the

road as the car raced down the hill.

“We are if I’ve anything to do with it,” mut-

tered Durriken.

Agathon lipped another card, laying it across

the top of the previous one. “Shit, looks like we

might have trouble up ahead.”

“I’m ready for it,” said Namid, from the back

seat.

The BMW shot across the Hawkesbury River

bridge. As they raced past the ambulance station

on the way up the hill, blue lights stabbed out of

the darkness as the highway patrol car started

to pull out into trafic after them.

Namid stared at it and smoke erupted from

under the hood of the cop car. Durriken felt the

ripple of magic before the car stopped dead in

its tracks. “That should slow them down for a

while,” Namid said with a chuckle.

“Nice work,” Durriken said, weaving the car

between trafic as he continued to accelerate up

the hill. His brow furrowed as he sped up the hill

on the northern side of the river, weaving between

trafic as he went. Something wasn’t right. It was

almost as if the Artifact was moving.

“What the fuck are those Pentacle cocksuck-

ers up to, Namid?” he said, as he imagined the

strands of Fate laid out in front of him as he drove.

Releasing Mana into the Imago, Durriken felt a

shift in the Seers’ fortunes. It was almost as if

the strands connecting them to the Artifact were

thinning. Things weren’t supposed to go this way;

after all, the Exarchs had already indicated that

the artifact would fall into his hands tonight.

“I’m having trouble seeing them. Whoever’s

shielding them is doing a fucking good job of

it,” Namid said. “But, by the looks of it, they’ve

turned off a major road and are heading onto a

back road somewhere.”

“Fuck,” muttered Durriken.

“They could be anywhere.”

Sending some more Mana to-

wards the Exarchs, he opened

his mind to whatever signs his

masters would deign to give

him. Please, give me something ,

he thought.

avoid him.

He spotted

a freeway exit

just up ahead and

began accelerating

again.

“I’ve seen the signs,”

he said as he pulled off the

freeway and sped up the exit

ramp.

Twenty-Four Hours Earlier, overlooking Sydney

Harbour

Durriken stared out the window at the lights

on Sydney Harbour. The Harbour Bridge was lit

up, some of the arch’s spans appearing to be

made from silver. Beyond the bridge, the sails of

the Sydney Opera House glowed softly against

the backdrop of the city center.

“Did you even hear what I just said?” Lexia

asked.

“Huh?” Durriken turned to face his supervi-

sor in the Seers of the Throne. And his lover. “I’m

sorry, hon. I got distracted.”

“You’ve been doing that ever since we arrived

in this stupid country,” Lexia said. She brushed

a strand of blonde hair back behind her ear, and

sat back in her seat, taking another sip of her

chardonnay. “What’s eating you, sweetie?”

Durriken shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ve

just been feeling... well, like there’s something

wrong here. Everything I’ve seen here points to

something big going on. I’m usually much more

conident about what the Exarchs are saying,

but here... here, everything seems to be upside

down.”

Lexia laughed. “Well, what do you expect?

You are in the land down under, after all.”

Durriken snorted. “Well, yeah, I guess there

is that.” He leaned back in his seat and rubbed

his temples. “I just haven’t been able to sleep

properly since I got here.”

“I know ! You’ve woken me up a few times

every night.”

Beside the road

ahead, a portable

sign lashed in the

darkness.

Right Lane Closed.

Merge Left.

Durriken felt

a surge of re-

lief wash over

him. The Ex-

a r c h s h a d

come through

for him again. He

slammed on

the brakes, the

BMW shuddering harshly

as the ABS prevented the wheels

from locking up.

Agathon looked up from his cards.

“What the fuck?”

Durriken downshifted twice, and

swung the car into the left-hand lane, in front of

a family sedan, which had to brake hard to

“I’m sorry, Lex. You know I’m not doing it

deliberately.”

Lexia leaned forward again. “What’s going

on? Is something bothering you, Durri?”

“I really don’t know,” Durriken said. “I’ve been

trying to divine what’s going on, what the Exarchs

are trying to say to me, but it’s not been working.

All the results come out muddled. It may just be

that I’m in a foreign country and that there’s a lot

of unfamiliar stuff going on here. Even if it does

feel something like home.”

“Well,” Lexia said, “we’ll be done here by

Friday, and we can get back to L.A. I can’t wait

to be out of this hellhole!”

Durriken laughed and pointed out the window.

“You call that a hellhole? You have got to be kid-

ding me, right? You never did see Mogadishu,

did you?’

“No, and I didn’t need to. I’ve done my time

in the trenches, and that’s why I’ve earned the

right to have people like you work for me now. It

means that I don’t need to worry about getting

my hands dirty chasing Pentacle idiots all over

the world.”

“Somebody has to stop the Pentacle,” Dur-

riken said, his eyes narrowing slightly. “If all the

Seers sat back and did nothing, those cock-

suckers would ind a way to rebuild the Celestial

Ladder and overthrow the Exarchs.”

Lexia leaned forward and kissed him gently

on the cheek. “Ever the brave knight, aren’t you,

Durri? You need to keep the faith! The Exarchs

will never let that happen, so there’s no point in

even worrying about it!”

She took another sip of her wine and sat

back again. “Now, did you ind out what the local

tetrarch needed?”

Durriken shook his head. “Not yet. I’ve been

working with a couple of the local Seers, Agathon

and Namid. They have potential, but they need

to be taught better strategies for keeping track

of the Pentacle.”

“Are you going to be inished by the week-

end?”

Shrugging, Durriken inished off his own glass

of wine. “I don’t know yet. Like I said, it feels as

though something is going on here. I’m worried

that if we leave too early, the Pentacle is going to

score a major victory in this country.”

“And like I said, the Exarchs would never let

that happen. You worry too much. Now, hurry up

and inish, so we can get out of here. The tetrarch

is expecting us for a harbor cruise.”

Durriken sighed. Lexia never worried about

anything, and it was going to be her downfall

someday.

* * *

Durriken ran through the maze, the walls

relecting the intense white light that seemed to

burn down from above. All the walls seemed the

same, a featureless expanse of stainless steel.

He paused momentarily at a junction, trying to

igure out which way to turn next.

“ Durriken ...” A whispered voice echoed off the

walls, but appeared to come from somewhere off

to the right. Durriken sprinted after it, turning right,

then left and then right again as he continued

through the maze.

Mage the Awakening - Seers of the Throne.pdf

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