by Bill Hiatt
“A truly amazing spell, but how does that help?” asked Ceridwen.
“The double will have all of Hafez’s memories, though it will still be under the control of the transformed person. We can tell in a matter of seconds whether he’s bluffing or not, and, if he isn’t, how to break the spell. Come to think of it, the double could also use the staff. Once we resolve things here, we could return home.”
Ceridwen nodded. “That sounds promising. Let us attempt it.”
“Tal and Magnus are the only ones among us who can do it, and they’re both pretty drained,” said Carla, slipping into her nurse persona.
“But we’re all fresh,” said Gordy. “Power sharing should work, right?”
Tal nodded. “The spell requires skill but not off-the-charts power.”
“All right,” said Carla, “but I want all of you healed before we do this.”
Viviane, whom Carla had worked on first, was already healed. It took only a few minutes for the two of them to finish with everyone else. Even so, I found myself becoming impatient. This blood double spell was like no magic I had ever heard of. I longed to see it demonstrated. Perhaps I could learn it. It would certainly be of use in Amun’s cause.
Tal did not ask me to join in the power sharing. He wasn’t as trusting as he appeared, but I could hardly blame him. Anyway, the less connection between us, the less chance he would detect my deception.
With a wave of his hand, Tal extracted a drop of blood from Hafez. He chanted in Welsh and moved his hands in a complicated pattern. The blood expanded and spread, becoming a faint mist that gathered around him. It coated him. It began to change.
Then it slid off and became a thin film on the carpet.
“What happened?” asked Carla.
“The spell failed,” said Tal. “We’ve never had that problem before.”
“Is it because whatever Apep did to make him immortal also made him inhuman?” asked Stan. “We know it’s hard to get human flesh to last as long as his has.”
Tal bent down and studied the blood. Magnus, Viviane, and Carla joined him. “There is a touch of serpent in the magic I can sense, but the blood is basically human. Besides, the spell has worked on faeries before, and even on elder Olympians. I doubt Hafez is any further from the human norm than that.”
“I’m getting a hint of something similar to Michael,” said Viviane. “You know, the way Cronus locked him. Apep couldn’t have used the same magic, but suppose he used something similar to keep Hafez from aging. Might that also interfere with the spell?”
“Let’s find out,” said Tal. Michael walked over without being asked, Tal took a drop of his blood and repeated the ritual. This time the blood twisted in midair, tied itself in fluid knots—did everything but move to envelop Tal. He released it, and it too fell and soaked into the carpet.
“Not the same response, but the same result,” said Tal. “Michael’s fast healing and magic resistance make his blood resist being repurposed in the same way that they would make his body resist a transformation spell. Hafez doesn’t seem to have fast healing or innate magic resistance, but he is prevented from aging, the way Michael was in the beginning. If we could understand how that was done, we might be able to reverse the effect.”
Viviane shook her head. “I’d leave that as a last resort. Genuine immortality spells are rare to begin with. The odds we can learn enough through observation alone to counteract one are pretty low. Besides, Hafez is about thirty-five hundred years past his expiration date. It’s possible breaking the spell would just disintegrate him, blood and all, triggering his cataclysm spell—if there is one.”
“There is another possible source of information,” said Ceridwen. “Hafez’s seer.”
Magnus snorted. “As if she’s going to tell us anything.”
“You might just be surprised. I’ve never met her—Hafez keeps her in seclusion—but I’m not sure she’s entirely on his side. She’s incredibly accurate, yet she missed my disloyalty. I worried every day that she’d detect it and give me away, but she never did.”
“The information seers get is often spotty,” said Tal.
“So it is—but think about what minute detail this one has managed to gather. She found Amenirdis in a parallel universe. That’s a feat even with the staff to draw vibrations from.”
“Another wild goose chase?” asked Magnus.
“We don’t really have a better option right now. Do you know where she is?” asked Tal.
“Top floor of the hotel. Her suite takes up the east half of the building.”
“You need me for this job,” said this world’s Khalid. He was sitting in the corner, leaning against the wall. So much had been going on that I’d forgotten all about him.
“The only place you’re going is straight into handcuffs,” said Magnus.
“Hey, I’m still here, aren’t I? I could easily have sneaked away while you guys were messing with Hafez’s blood.”
“Maybe you were just waiting for the right moment to stick a knife in our backs,” said Magnus.
“I wouldn’t mind sticking one in yours, that’s for sure.” His voice had a belligerent tone, but he looked down at the floor instead of at Magnus. “But in case you weren’t paying attention, when the chips were down, Hafez used me as a human shield. He was ready to let me burn in the Nubian’s fire to save himself.”
His voice fell to a whisper. “I don’t know much about having a real family—but even I know a good father wouldn’t sacrifice his kid. You guys…you were right. The bastard was just using me. I owe him nothing.”
Magnus scowled at Tal. “Don’t tell me, let me guess—Other Khalid gets to go with us.”
“Cuff him,” said Tal. “And yes, Magnus, he gets to go with us. He may know something useful. They’ll be enough of us to contain him if he tries to cause trouble.”
“Who’s going?” asked Jimmie. “Those of us who had some sleep could take over this time.”
“Unfortunately, I need the same people, and for the same reasons,” said Tal. “However, I’d like everyone else to come, too. Power sharing is going to be critical.”
“Or you could get some sleep first,” said Carla.
“I’d love to, but we don’t know enough, like how often Hafez has to do something to keep the spell from destroying the Santa Maria Valley and when the last time he did it was. Judging from his manner, I’d say we have some time, but I’m not sure how much.
“Ceridwen, I’d like to ask you to keep an eye on Hafez, but—”
“You don’t know whether you can trust me or not,” said Ceridwen. “You had no reason to trust my counterpart, and since I’ve seemed to change sides twice, it must look as if you can’t trust me, either.”
“That pretty well sums it up,” said Magnus.
“You can both read minds, correct?” asked Ceridwen, looking back and forth between Tal and Magnus.
“Yes, we both have that rare gift,” said Tal. “But we can’t easily read someone with a will as strong as yours.”
“Then let me lower all my barriers. I wouldn’t even consider such a thing normally, but since it seems the only way I can convince you of the truth of my words, I am willing.”
I was no mind reader, but I could feel Ceridwen’s sudden vulnerability. Never before had I felt such total submission from one so powerful, except in the presence of a pharaoh.
Tal and Magnus spent a few minutes sifting through her exposed mind, glancing at each other occasionally as they did so.
“You really are on our side,” said Tal, sounding surprised.
“Yeah, there’s no doubt,” said Magnus. “I didn’t feel even a shadow of resistance.”
Ceridwen nodded, and I felt her normal mental protections snap back into place. “Now that you are satisfied, I trust you can ask me to watch Hafez with no qualms.
“Absolutely,” said Tal. “Please make sure he doesn’t wake up.”
Ceridwen nodded. “I can’t leave, anyway. I kept the se
rvants away today, but I can’t keep doing that without arousing suspicion—and my attorney is frantic to talk to me. Creirwy and Morfran will help me with clean-up and take turns watching our prisoner.”
“Sounds good,” said Tal.
“Morfran, I may need my sword,” said Shar.
“And I’ll need mine,” said Gordy, looking at me.
“No problem,” I said as I unbuckled the scabbard.
“Thank you for using it to help me break my curse,” said Morfran as he picked up the sword and handed it to Shar.
Shar glanced over at the swirling ball of dark energy. “It doesn’t look completely broken to me, just…dislodged.”
“I can take care of that as well,” said Ceridwen. “Go do what you have to do.”
“It will take us a minute or two to get coordinated,” said Tal. “We leave in five. Everyone, make sure you’ve got everything you need.”
“Amy, can I speak with you a moment?” asked Magnus. His tone was oddly polite for him.
“Sure,” I said. He took my arm gently but firmly and led me away from the others. Once we were far enough away to satisfy him, he swirled what I took to be some kind of privacy spell around us. Our surroundings receded into a mist. I could neither hear nor see the others.
“All, right, Amenirdis, here’s how it’s going to be.”
“I’m Amy.”
“Don’t try to trick a trickster. When I first…came into physical existence, I spent days pretending to be Tal. I know what to look for. You’ve got the language down, but you don’t carry yourself quite the way Amy does. Anyone who’s seen both of you and pays close enough attention will know. Of course, I could just tell them—”
“What is it you want?” I could have denied what he was saying, but like Tal, he could read minds—and I doubted he tried to avoid doing so in the way Tal did. I could resist, but I couldn’t prove my innocence.
“Make me a priest of Amun.”
I could not have been more surprised if Hafez had announced he was devoting his life to charity. “What—I can’t do that even if I wanted to. Only the pharaoh or a priest appointed by pharaoh can make another priest.”
“I’d believe that if I wasn’t aware that women were sometimes pharaohs in ancient Egypt. You may technically not be a priest as a god’s wife, but you certainly performed religious functions. In an emergency, surely you could have acted to restore a priesthood—especially as there is no reigning pharaoh or surviving priests. I assume you don’t accept the authority of Hafez.”
“Why would you want such a thing? You don’t worship Amun, do you?”
“Look, Hafez is never going to help us get back home, and we can’t trust you. You’re deceiving us even now. If the others knew, Tal would reactivate Arianrhod’s spell without a second thought.
“The problem is, there’s only one person besides Hafez that we know for sure can use the staff. Other Khalid’s use of that bad fake doesn’t prove he can use the real one. That means we’d have to rely on you to get us home. Whatever you say, I doubt you’re going to send us back, either—not unless we agree to help you return Amun’s access to Earth, which the Boy Scout will never do.
“He wouldn’t offer to worship Amun, either. I, on the other hand, would worship Justin Bieber if it got me back home.
“Are you saying you will help me restore Amun?”
“No, I’m not. I agree with Tal that trying to breach the barriers between planes of existence that way will probably cause a cataclysm. But don’t confuse yourself with someone who has a choice. I’m not offering to help you destroy one or more universes. I’m just offering to keep you free for a while longer. That’s the best—probably the only—offer you’re going to get.
“You’ll take it—and be thankful you’re getting anything. Between the lyre and my own magical ability, I could probably force you to do as I ask. Strong-willed as you are, I could rip your mind apart if I had to force you to comply. Thank your gods I’m giving you a way to avoid that fate.”
“I have seen you play…what is it called? Oh yes, bad cop. I have seen you play bad cop once too often to take that threat seriously.”
Magnus grabbed my shoulders roughly with both hands. “I was bluffing with Other Khalid, but not now. The kid may be a lying little bastard, but he hasn’t really done anything to me personally. You, on the other hand, ripped into my mind, dredged up every ounce of pain I’ve ever felt, and shoved it in my face—and in everyone else’s, giving them a little reminder of all the reasons they have to hate me.
“If I didn’t need you, I’d grab a sword and hack you to bits with it. But even that wouldn’t be enough. I’d keep you alive and conscious, keep your soul trapped in your ruin of a body until I’d diced it into separate cells. Even then, I wouldn’t let you go. I’d keep your soul tied to each individual, raw, screaming particle of your former self. I’d pour the whole mess into a jar somewhere and keep it with me forever.”
Magnus’s grip tightened, and there was murder in his eyes—not a crime of passion, but cold calculation. Magnus had thought about an elaborate homicide even before Amy had asked him to free me.
My first impulse was to cry out. I might be able to make myself heard even through his anti-eavesdropping spell. But the best I could hope for then was to be revealed and imprisoned again by Arionhrod’s spell. Amy had been forgiven, but I had not. The others would never permit the destruction of her body. My mind? That I could not be so sure of. Even so, the thought of making Tal’s runaway dark side a priest of Amun filled me with almost as much horror as his lurid threats of mutilation and perpetual pain.
“If you do not truly worship Amun—”
Magnus’s grip tightened still further, but his voice became oddly calm. “I’ll go through the motions. I’ll put up a little altar in my apartment. I’ll make some sacrifices. That’s more than anyone else would do.”
What a miserable choice! Commit the sacrilege of raising this unbeliever to the priesthood or fail my god.
“Very well,” I said, though the words were like poison in my mouth. “Kneel before me.”
Seer in a Maze
We traveled by portal to the suite occupied by the Khalid of this world.
“The seer’s suite is right across the hall just like Ceridwen told us,” he said. He was sullen and kept holding up his handcuffed hands as if someone would take pity on him. “I’ve never been in her suite. Hafez always told me not to knock or anything like that.”
“Security?” asked Tal.
“Not that I ever saw. But somebody would need the right key to access this floor by elevator or stairway, and the stair door is alarmed, so nobody could pick the lock or break it down. There are normally also magic protections, but Hafez took down the ones on this room before you came the first time, so I could give you that fake story.”
“We already know how to disable the alarms on this floor,” said Tal. “Do you know anything about the magic protections?”
“General protection against spells being cast from outside and protection against portals. I think there’s also some kind of protection against snooping, like in the Summerland House.”
“Yeah, we felt that before,” said Tal. “And you can put your hands down. The cuffs aren’t coming off yet.”
Other Khalid scowled and raised both middle fingers.
“How’d you like it if I broke those for you?” asked Magnus.
“We don’t need any more threats,” said Eva. “Khalid, you understand why we can’t trust you yet, right? The cuffs will come off eventually. We’ll also follow through on what Tal promised you—finding you a real family.”
Eva’s tone seemed too kind to me. The right way to handle a captive was through fear—yet the boy did put his hands down.
“Those of us with magic should scan the hallway and see if anything out of the ordinary is out there.”
“Just as with this suite, I can’t detect any magic in the hall or in the other suite,” said Viviane. “I
can sense someone in the suite, though. There are no security guards, but I can sense someone in the suite. Since the place has such high security, that is almost certainly the seer.”
“Agreed,” said Tal. Stan and I will double-check to make sure the electronic security is down, and then we’ll take a little trip across the hall.”
Magnus grinned at me, and I looked away. I was not proud of what I had done to buy his silence.
“Is everything OK?” asked Lucas. “You seem a little off.”
“I guess I still haven’t adjusted,” I said, doing my best to sound like Amy. “The world is so different from what I thought it was.”
Lucas nodded. “I had much more time to adjust, and it’s still hard for me, too. It gets easier, though. I promise.”
Tentatively, as if giving me a chance to object, he slipped an arm around me. Despite having all these people around, I was alone, and it felt good to be held. Amy’s faint struggles became even weaker. She didn’t like anything else I was doing, but she wasn’t hating my interest in Lucas. Surrounded by his warmth, I was reminded that at some point, I would need to wed. From what I’d seen, he was my best prospect.
“Get a room,” said Magnus, poking Lucas in the shoulder. I imagined blasting Magnus with Ra’s sunlight until he baked. I couldn’t do that—yet—but thinking about it made me feel better.
“All security is down on this floor,” said Tal. “I’ll keep us invisible and inaudible to others, just in case.”
He led the way over to the door. It took a minute for all of us to file into the hall, which had the same desert-sand colored carpet as Khalid’s suite. The murals on the hallway walls were similar, with the same watchful serpents. There was no magic within them, at least not that I could feel, but they filled me with uneasiness.
Tal tried the door handle, but the door was locked.
“Knock or pick the lock?” asked Stan.
“I’m not as ready as Ceridwen to believe the seer might secretly be hostile to Hafez,” said Tal. “There may not be much point in trying to sneak up on a seer, but let’s give it a try. Khalid, you’re up.”
