Caller of Lightning

by Eytan Kollin

  Years of being too old, too overweight, too . . . everything, just melted away. He was hurt, but healing. “Shango,” he called. “I need you!”

  It was a very familiar feeling, then. Magic had been unleashed in response to his call, but now he could sense it, as though feeling his own pulse.

  He heard the Countess of Yarmouth scream in pain, then Shango’s voice echoing through the night. “Come, my storm, wash this land clean!”

  Ben struggled to move. Behind him, the King was locked in position, both palms flat against the Bell, working to complete the deadly ritual.

  Shango’s axe, afire with electricity, came flying through the air and spun to a halt in the rubble, within Ben’s reach. He seized its handle and drew enough strength from the lightning to stand. Trying not to think too hard about it, Ben spun the axe in circles over his head. Electric tendrils arced out from one side of it to each of his companions, connecting them to him in a great skein of force. From the other side of the axe head a flare of lightning jumped to dance among the rods in the array.

  George watched in horror, unable to interrupt the ritual and defend himself. It was a race. He turned back to face the Bell, refocusing his concentration, chanting even faster.

  The clouds boiled, burning away as the comet ripped through them, consuming half the horizon. Then the electrical maelstrom that blazed around Ben shot lightning upward into the sky, completing a circuit with the storm.

  Ben spun the axe a final time. Then, with all of the strength of his body and his fiercely stubborn mind, amplified by the belief and powers of his friends, and backed by a god-created storm, he slammed the axeblade down into the Bell as he shouted, “ABRECAN!”

  The world shattered.

  The spell consumed the Bell, which crumbled to dust in seconds; then it spread like a cankerous disease, rotting away the King’s armor; and at last, in the tempest above them, the comet broke into a billion cindery shards that were seized by the winds and scattered across a continent as they burned down to motes that mixed with the air and land.

  Ben dropped the axe, then took a single deep breath and fell to his knees. The lightning was gone. The storm was gone. Rain began to fall, pelting everything in sight.

  He looked toward the King and saw only a burnt skeletal figure, frozen in the moment of its stolen triumph. As he watched, the rain picked away at it, cutting through the char, dissolving the ugly thing by inches. In moments, what remained of his former monarch was little more than an indistinguishable mound of muddy ash, now slowly washing away.

  Of the great Bell itself, there was nothing left to see.

  Sally rushed to Ben’s side, and her injured Mouser gently licked Ben’s hair.

  “Did we win, Papa?” Sally asked.

  “I’m not certain anyone won, my child. But we survived, and at least one evil is no more, so that’s something. Just now, however, I need to rest my eyes for a moment.” He patted the back of Sally’s hand, then, exhausted, he passed out.

  1760

  01 A.S.

  (Anno Seorsum; or After Sundering)

  The

  Franklin Home

  Philadelphia,

  The Sundered World

  March 16th

  43

  The First Year of Magic

  “Pass and Stowe have finished casting a new bell,” said Isaac Norris. “I’m on my way there now to inspect it, but I thought it best to drop these off with you first.”

  Ben looked up from the experimental device he was repairing and saw that Norris was holding a thick sheaf of papers. “Bit on the busy side here for the next hour or two, Isaac. Is it something requiring immediate attention?”

  “First land area estimates for the new territories. Be ready to discuss them when the Assembly convenes on Friday, please. I can promise you Joseph Fox will be firing a whole salvo of opinions. You’ll want to prepare, and not simply rely on the marvelous Mr. Collinson to whisper observations in your ear as you normally do.”

  “I’ll make sure to study them tonight. Meanwhile, just drop them anywhere on my desk.” Ben gestured vaguely to the mahogany monstrosity snugged up against the wall behind him. Not a single surface of the desk showed wood, being rather over-stacked with too many papers and books.

  “Easier said than done,” Norris laughed. “And here I thought this place was untidy in the before days . . . ”

  Norris was right, Ben knew. Because of his critical role in current exploration, the workshop had rapidly become a central collection point for every scrap of information gathered about the world they now called home—so like the old in some ways, yet radically, absolutely different in every way that counted.

  To manage, Ben had ordered his workshop expanded in size and split into two sections. The left half was dominated by boxes and papers and sample cases and a giant map of the known lands of the Sundered Americas. Tacked to the map were symbol-covered summaries detailing the different types of magic that had been observed so far and the methodologies of their usage. There was shamanism and tribal storytelling to be found here, side by side with Christian and deistic prayer; and shapeshifters, ghosts, and creatures of legend roamed freely. This surely isn’t William Penn’s colony any more, thought Ben. It is ours alone, and I wonder what we shall make of it . . .

  The workshop’s right hall still looked like the domain of an ordered mind, though much of the research now conducted there dealt with subjects once dismissed out of hand as superstition. Right now its most prominent feature was a rig Ben had designed to measure limited levels of magical force, and a series of systematic charts and tables through which he was calculating the physical cost to the practitioner. So far, it seemed that no matter the type of magic, once used, the mage who cast it must refuel by eating. A lot.

  Ben turned to his old friend. “Here.” He smiled. “I’ll put those away myself. Wouldn’t want you to vanish into this forest and never be seen again. Give my best to Pass and Stowe. I hope the new bell will sound right.”

  “Yes,” Isaac replied dryly. “Do try to avoid breaking this one.”

  Ben shook his head. “No guarantees—didn’t mean to break the other one. Who knows what creatures could come now?”

  Isaac paused at the door. “Well, that is why we have our own wizard to protect the city, isn’t it?”

  “Indeed, it is. My best to your dear wife!”

  “Thank you,” Isaac said as he left.

  When he was satisfied with the repair he had effected, Ben turned to pick up the papers. Before he could determine the right place to store them, the workshop’s outer door once again opened and more people came in, bounding this time. It was Polly and Sally, followed by her large and loving Mouser. The cat was battle-scarred, with only a stub of a left ear and all the fur from that ear to the nape of his neck singed off—but he was whole and refused to be parted from Sally.

  “Father! Father! You’ll never guess!”

  Polly laughed. “Give him space, Sally. But really, Ben, you won’t guess. It’s brilliant.”

  Hearing their voices from within the house, Deborah Franklin came to the open inner door and called out, “Mind your pattens, girls. I’ll not have you two track dirt all over.”

  “Yes, Mother,” they both chimed. With no way back to the old world, at least for now, the Franklin household had welcomed Polly just as Ben had been welcomed into the Stevenson household in London.

  Polly handed Ben a package as Sally gushed. “Everyone is talking about it! There is a settlement of people from Norway, only a day’s ride away, that has trolls!” She jumped up and down in excitement. “Trolls, Papa! Pleeeaaase can we go investigate?”

  Debby frowned at her family. “Ben, you are not going to let them do any such thing on their own. You must go with them. Trolls, is it now? What next!”

  “Of course I’ll go. I have a package I’d like to drop off for Mobo and Jemima anyway—we can do that on our way out of town. The trip will also give us a chance to s
top by the Countess’s cabin and see how she fares in her penance.”

  “Thank you, Mama,” said Sally. She patted Mouser, whose rumbling purr quickly filled the room. “Polly and I promise we’ll keep Father safe.”

  Debby’s frown now focused on him alone, Ben noticed; a change of subject was clearly called for. Fortunately, he had one in hand. Unwrapping the package, he announced, “Look here! My new sign has arrived, and, as always, Mr. Loxley has hit it upon the nose.”

  He held it up for his wife’s approval.

  “Oh, go on,” she said, “Hang the sign.”

  “Come, Debby—come put it up on the hooks with me. And you two,” he said, wagging a finger at Polly and Sally, “are needed for cheers and applause. This is a serious matter; I insist it be witnessed, and all laughter is expressly forbidden.”

  But of course all four of them laughed, Ben hardest of all, even as he marveled at the altered nature of his life and the wonders waiting on the horizon.

  The sign read, simply:

  Benjamin Franklin

  Wizard for Hire