by Duke Kittle
* * *
Tina's projection stood within the High Theorist's chamber with its arms folded. Having given High Theorist Sythus her report, she waited for him to digest it all as he sat at his desk. His wings were folded down against his shoulders, and his fingertips tapped together in front of his muzzle.
“This is quite vexing, Lady van Schtoffen.” He lowered his hands into his lap. “To stop magic without the power of magic when it is most often magic which must defeat magic. You are certain there is no way you can unravel the protection which shields the Dragon Eaters from harm?”
Tina shook her head. “Magic cannot be used anywhere near them. The only solution I can devise is to find the resonance of their magical protection and try to attune to it. But no power of magic can function around them. Even from a distance, my glasses will not let me peer into the equations affecting the Dragon Eaters. I have tried to follow the prophet's advice to seek out knowledge from the wizard who created them, but it would appear the wizard did not wish his knowledge exposed. Every corner I turn is another trap he has laid beneath my feet. Even dead, the wizard's magic endures.”
“The prophet's words.” Sythus ticked one eyebrow up. “Recite them to me again, if you would.”
Tina laid her ears back against her hair. Relying on the words of a prophet never suited her very well because they could only ever see part of what they were predicting, and many prophets tended to be manipulative. So even what they did reveal could be considered subjective. “Master, I do not think relying on the prophet will lead me to an answer at this juncture. I cannot find any trace of real evidence left behind by the wizard who was killed.”
“You told me he was eaten,” the High Theorist leaned forward against his desk with his hands folded on top of it, “but are you certain he was killed? From what you tell me, the one who informed you of what happened to him is no scholar of magic. Please, the prophet's words, Lady van Schtoffen.”
Tina lifted her hand to rub her forehead, but doing so only made her fingers press through the projection's intangible skin. “His words were 'Discover the truth upon which light is shed in the knowledge granted by those who are dead'.”
The High Theorist's eyebrow ticked upward again. “Those who are dead. You must learn to listen more carefully to the words of a prophet if you wish to find any benefit in them, Lady van Schtoffen. If the prophet had said 'he who is dead,' I would have believed it was the wizard whose knowledge you must seek. But the prophet said ‘those who are dead,’ meaning more than one.”
Tina let her hand drift away from her head and fall back to her side. “Those who are dead? My lord,” she sighed, “that only confuses me further. How is it simpler to find many who are dead when I cannot even follow the trail of the one?”
“Because you know the one is covering his trail. Perhaps the many are not.” The High Theorist rose from his desk. “I have done some of my own investigating on this end, Tina. And I think it is possible I may have come across something which could be useful to you. I did not think it of importance to your investigation before because I did not yet know exactly with what you were dealing.”
The High Theorist walked to one of the bookshelves and removed a red, leather-bound book from the end of one shelf. He thumbed through several book marks before coming to the second to last one. He opened the book and turned it toward Tina to show her the marked page. “Do you recognize this artifact?”
Tina looked at the page. Drawn on it was a head from a beast unknown to Tina. It looked decayed and old but not entirely ridden of its flesh. The top was rounded, and the expression around its empty eyes was one of gloom. Its flat face looked aged, and the only thing resembling a mouth Tina could make out was a vertical slit which extended down for almost a foot between a pair of elongated mandibles. If it had any discernible ears, Tina couldn't see them. In the center of its face was a depiction of an arachnid resembling a spider but with the upper body of a humanoid.
When Sythus turned to the next page, Tina could see the same head but with its mandibles raised and spread wide open. There were sharp hooks lining the interior of the mandibles and a single hole in the middle of them. With the mandibles open, Tina could see the artist had depicted some sort of glow coming from the eyes.
Tina shook her head. “That is a horrid looking thing, master, but I do not recognize it.”
“I cannot say I am surprised.” He turned the book around to look down at the picture. “Aracheah relics are rare, and those which we do have in Kerovnia are contained by powerful wards. In the Aracheah language, this one is called Exil'idya, he who exiles souls.”
“He?” Tina leaned her head back with a look of revulsion. “Is this artifact living?”
The High Theorist shook his head. “Living is a question of debate, but it's not unusual in the complex language of the Aracheah for them to assign even objects a gender.”
“I think I understand, master, but why do you bring it up?”
“As I said before, we keep Aracheah relics under powerful containing wards, but we also keep them under powerful protective wards as well so they can't be stolen or misused.” He walked back to the shelf and put the book back into its spot. “Exil'idya was contained within our vaults until recently.”
Tina's ears stood up. She suddenly had at least a small notion of where the conversation was going. “How recently?”
The High Theorist seated himself back behind his desk. “Of that, I cannot be certain. It seems the caretaker of Exil'idya decided not to report its theft and replaced it with a false one while he conducted his own search.” Sythus leaned back in his seat with his hands on his stomach. “While I commend him for trying to rectify the problem on his own, I cannot forgive that he would let such a relic slip from our care without so much as informing, at the very least, me.”
“Wouldn't it take an exceptionally powerful wizard to break into the city of Kerovnia and steal such a relic from our very home?”
Sythus wrinkled his muzzle. “Wouldn't it take an exceptionally powerful wizard to create such monsters as the Dragon Eaters?” He leaned forward and once more folded his hands together in front of his muzzle. “Tina... the creation of animate creatures such as the Dragon Eaters would require the summoning of spiritual energy, even souls. Do you have any reason to believe that such a relic could be anywhere in Likonia?”
Tina's mind turned back to one detail which she had regarded as minor at the time it had been mentioned. “...Yes, I do.”
The High Theorist sighed in anxiety. “Tina, if the wizard possessed such a relic, it is highly possible he used it to transfer the soul of someone who hated the Maldavians into his creations in order to drive the monsters to destroying them.”
Tina shook her head. “I do not think it was a success, my lord.”
“I agree. If what you told me about the Dragon Eater who tried to get you to flee from the cavern is correct, then I think the wizard must have used the two Kamadene women to create the Dragon Eaters. Wizards of the Purita Combus have been known to bind the souls of their servants to themselves in the event they should have a need for spiritual magic, which, considering they toy with the magic surrounding life and death, is quite often.” Sythus leaned back in his seat. “Why he used his servants' souls rather than the souls of more malicious folk, I do not know.”
“My lord,” Tina's ears swiveled to face the High Theorist, “I believe the wizard must have intended to use the souls of Kaelus and Malidath to drive the Dragon Eaters.”
Sythus bowed his head in agreement. “I believe you are right. From your description of what happened in the caverns, I believe he was successful in taking the souls of Kaelus and Malidath from their separate resting places. But if that is true, he must have had the souls contained within Exil'idya already. The only explanation I can come up with as to why he would not have used them was if Exil'idya was stolen before he could deliver the souls to the Dragon E
aters.”
Tina looked perplexed. “Why stolen, master?”
The High Theorist tapped his fingers together, then his wings fanned as he rose. “A suspicion. This may be nothing, Tina, but have you confirmed the identity of this 'Captain Cephalin' yet?”
Tina nodded. “Yes, my lord. He is the same Idori Cephalin who it is believed was responsible for the massacre at Empusa.”
Sythus rubbed his chin in thought. “Seek him out. After our talk about him, I had your student, Denna, searching through records and documents recovered from Empusa after it was captured from the Idassians in the last war. It would seem that Empusa was second only to the city of Zancrose as a major gathering site for the Purita Combus. And, if what Denna has uncovered is true, Idori may be the one who stole Exil'idya from this unknown wizard. And, if that is true, he may truly be innocent of the Massacre of Empusa.”
Tina's eyes grew a little wider as she stepped closer to the High Theorist's desk. “How?”
The High Theorist folded his hands behind his back. “The cultists in Empusa were playing with more than just the magic of life and death. In one of their journals, as your very thorough student Denna uncovered, a note was made that a powerful demon was being contained by the cult within Empusa.” He lifted his hand and extended one finger. “Such a demon as they made note of would cause Idori to be nigh impervious to magic when the demon has its strongest grasp on his soul. I would have no other evidence to support this if one of our prophets had not tried to look into Idori's memories and ended up nearly dead for her trouble.”
“But why would the demon compel him to steal the Exil'idya?”
“Because demons feed on the souls of living beings. If Idori's soul is being fed upon, and the demon believed it had a way to continue to feed on the souls of others without having to destroy its host, then it would most certainly do so.”
Tina lowered her eyes to the ground. There was a lot to process, but the High Theorist's advice and knowledge had given her a direction. It would need to be the object of her focus. “If all of our suppositions are true, I will need to confirm them. And if they are true, I must find a way to compel Idori to hand over Exil'idya.”
The High Theorist looked at Tina solemnly. “This is a dangerous undertaking, Tina. If the demon suspects you are trying to take Exil'idya from Idori, it will do everything not only to prevent you from finding it, but to prevent Idori from giving it away.”
Tina didn't have to search her thoughts for long. “...I think I may know who can persuade him, master. I just hope she has the strength.”
