Iron And Magic Novels & Stories

"They've taken the heart of Polonias." "Oh no." My mom and Cindy had told me that story too. How Abernathy infused the land with magic. "What does that mean?" I asked, confused. Cindy stood and reached for me. "Abernathy changed the land, but it still possessed a heart, or the place where all the magic generated from. As you can imagine, since it's kept this realm going for many years, the heart contains a lot of powerful magic." She clutched her hands together. "If Sharra has taken it - " She didn't finish because the ground began to shake and a large crack split the land in two.

Perhaps Grandpa Kent was right, Werewolves once had the ability to wield Magic, but had long ago been cut off from the source. As I quietly descended the stairs with my letter in hand, I knew my parents would abhor the idea of me participating in Iridian. In the long history of Iridian, there hasn’t been a single person who rejected the invitation. I held no interest in playing the game, and was unwilling to risk my mind or life in the process, but the Game Master had stolen something of mine.

The heavy iron portcullis groaned upward, its massive iron teeth lifting slowly into the dark granite archway. As the slaver wagon rolled beneath the gate, we crossed the sovereign boundary of the Lycan Kingdom. The shift was instant and suffocating. It wasn't just a physical border marked by mountain peaks and boundary posts; it was an ancient, invisible barrier saturated with centuries of dominant, predatory magic. The moment the wooden wheels rolled past the massive, moss-covered monoliths flanking the road—monoliths carved with glowing, ice-blue runes—a sudden, crushing weight slammed down onto my chest.

Iron saves me. It burns. Not in the way it once did. Not with physical agony. Time taught my body to tolerate it. But my magic never forgets. My magic recoils constantly, like a beast chained inside my bones. I tighten my grip around the pendant briefly. Stay buried. Stay hidden. Stay alive. The abandoned theater waits ahead, its crumbling structure forgotten by the modern world. Its windows are shattered. Its doors sealed. Its purpose erased. Humans abandoned places like this when they rebuilt their cities after the war. Too damaged. Too expensive. Too unnecessary.

Spells danced across the pages, their whispers resounding through the stillness of the room. And then, a glimmer of understanding pierced the veil of my consciousness. The words on the scrolls converged, forming a picture of ancient rituals and forgotten incantations. A surge of anticipation coursed through me. I had found it—the key to unlocking the dormant magic within. I had found the only object that could take away and give magic blood. The Belvidere Illinois Amulet. It is a Red amulet that has magic blood stored inside it. If I could find it and have it as mine then I would be able to save everyone.

The iron collar didn't just chafe. It was a living, breathing parasite that actively chewed through my flesh. Forged by paranoid Lycan sorcerers, the rusted band was practically welded around my throat. But where others just felt pain, my mind—naturally wired like a master architect—constantly mapped the flawed energy circuits of its ancient suppression runes. I could physically see the flow of their archaic magic. I knew exactly where the magical load-bearing points were, and I knew how to shatter them. I just didn't have the raw kinetic energy to trigger the glitch in its system. Not yet.

He said break it, full stop. So I looked down at the heavy blackened iron ring clenched in my palm—the Lycan crown. Then I looked at the expanding fissure in the center, the one splitting everything open. Hundreds of feet beneath, a river of boiling, toxic green magma churned and roared, the raw magical core of this badlands nightmare.

Rolled his eyes. "Of course, with any new discovery, there was a huge revolution about revealing magic as the work of demons or dark gods. Then as more and more people were found to possess these different mental abilities, Iron Serpent was formed. They started their auspicious beginnings as one of the original testing centers. MagCorp, as it stands now, is the great-grandchild of magical testing facilities setup and designed by IS."

The flames turned into jagged shards of orange glass that fell and shattered on the ground. "We can't get close, Emma!" Félix shouted, his daggers useless against the void. "It’s not a physical cold! It’s the Absence of Motion!" I looked at the Iron-Wolves of the South. They were standing at the edge of the plaza, their skin iridescent with the magnetized silver-iron of their new evolution. "Arthur! The Iron-Blood!" I cried. "Your marrow! It’s the only thing with enough density to resist the Zero!"

That is if I get the chance to live a lifetime. “I guess they took every precaution necessary.” I half laughed, and my father shook his head at my dry humor. Iron was a faeries weakness, and the worst one at that. It burned the skin to the touch, and stopped any magic coming from their bodies. It made us weak, and sick, leaving us nothing but totally mortal. The method was rarely used anymore to contain us, but sometimes there were special circumstances. Special circumstances, it seemed, like me. “I’ll find us a way out of here, I promise.” I said quietly, but the voice inside of me was telling me it was hopeless.