by Kim Wedlock
Rathen's eyes hardened inquisitively. "Roane? What do you make of him?"
"He is a fine and proficient leader."
The absolute conviction of Caiden's statement deflated some of Rathen's doubt, but the next question that presented itself - one born of his own loyalty - trapped itself behind his teeth. Arator had told him everything he needed, and he knew in turn that Rosh wouldn't have allowed the man's promotion if he wasn't suited to the task of succeeding him. But he remained stubbornly unsatisfied.
The sergeant must have seen it in his eyes, for he answered the unspoken question anyway. "There is no doubt over Sahrakh Forlin's capability. We will follow him willingly."
Reluctantly, Rathen straightened and gave a single nod of acceptance. "Very well." Again he began to turn away, but the soldier stunned him with a wholly unexpected question. He turned back slowly and shook his head with such remorse that he surprised himself. "No. The Order doesn't need me, and I don't need its rules. And there are...things I need to do that those rules would hold back."
Caiden studied him for a moment, then his eyes dropped to Aria who stood at his side, still looking up and between the two with awe. He looked back to Rathen and nodded. "I understand." He saluted again, then, upon Rathen's withering consent, turned and left the room.
Rathen sighed in relief as the door clicked shut, but shortly discovered the rest of them looking at him rather oddly, as though they were suddenly rearranging their opinion of him.
He cleared his throat uncomfortably and slipped past them towards the food on the table.
Chapter 51
The air was heavy with the musty smell of old parchment and ink, a smell that had the strange ability both to comfort and unsettle in its invoking of whispered memories: the unreasonable fear of chastisement for the slightest mistake, the catastrophic punishments for tardiness, the fifteen minutes of detention that spanned a lifetime, while interwoven was the safe certainty and routine of every day life, of lessons, of classrooms, of mentors and peers, of knowing what each day would bring.
Now, though, it spelled out hope, and with that hope came a distinct panic under the roaring possibility of rejection.
Rathen watched Owan leaf carefully through his notebook, through Anthis's translations, through their joint workings and individual musings, but for every passing moment the scholar's face betrayed none of his thought. Despite the grand magister's refutation, Rathen still had hope, and its increasingly fragile existence hinged upon their location and its inciting aroma. Surrounded by knowledge and the achievements of his predecessors, Owan might be more inclined to entertain the idea of taking the task for himself. He might even fathom an idea and be able to carry it through on the spot if the references he needed were on hand. He chose to overlook the fact that his old friend had never been selfishly impulsive.
The concentrated frown deepened, and Rathen felt his impatience rise a step higher. Finally, Owan set the papers down with a sigh, sat back in his seat, and regarded his old friend with a curious look. "It could work," he said carefully.
"It could?"
"I...I think so...to be honest, it's a little over my head..."
"Well that's probably just because it's unfinished. It looks a bit of a mess right now, but it will all come together when the few final areas are worked out - just little things, like how to make the connection at the base: where to link the two spells, for how long, and where to split them apart, because I don't believe they need to be intertwined completely. Then expanding the spell to touch all the magic at a location rather than just one spell chain - but that's more a matter of usage than construction, and confining the power to do what it has to rather than break out of control and falter. It's not a question of personal strength," he added quickly, watching the dubious frown grow deeper on his old friend's face, "casting the spell bit by bit will satisfy that, but more the reinforcement of the edges of the spells. It really is just little things..."
Owan blinked slowly. "Yes, just little things." He shook his head. "'Bit by bit'?"
"...Why not?"
"Why not?!" He bit his incredulity back behind a rasping whisper, and his eyes suddenly blazed with a mixture of insult and desperate calculation. "Because it's...it's..."
"It's how the elves did it."
"Yes, Rathen: elves."
He felt his heart suddenly flutter in panic at the abrupt crumbling of his manipulative plan. The very roots of his confidence shook at the scholar's alarm, but even while the steady voice of reason was quick to remind him that there were a few key details his old friend was unaware of, he found himself somewhat disinclined to share them after the grand magister's conclusion.
Rathen forced himself into composure. If he was to convince Owan to take the task off his hands, he couldn't let it seem as futile as he was right to think. "It can be done."
"The idea is preposterous."
"There is no other choice." He held him in a morose stare, and Owan's stubborn conviction began to deflate.
"No," he sighed finally, slumping back into his seat, "I suppose there isn't... All right..." He sat forwards and looked over the papers again, a studious air of deliberation falling over him even as his doubt remained as thick as a storm cloud above. "Right. Well...first, if the two spells are going to be connected, there's no need for both of them to start with a nominative chain; if the foundational spell begins with the nominative chain then the obliteration spell can be linked in subsequently rather than doubling up. It would be less effort but just as effective, and there's less room for something to go wrong. But, once they're linked, they'll begin acting simultaneously and there's going to be a break down if both spells are trying to act on the same thing at once - one can't suspend the subject if the other is obliterating it. So they'll need to be just short of synchronised. If the spell to suspend has to be involved--"
"It does."
He glanced up, and Rathen saw the dubious look creeping back in. "Then that one will have to come first, if only barely. There will need to be a timing or deferral chain added to the obliteration spell the moment they split apart, which should only be once the full parameters of the subject are described. That should allow the suspension the room to satisfy and give the obliteration the opportunity to act in peace, while at the same time keeping each spell separate enough that their respective purposes don't get confused."
Rathen nodded slowly, trying to work out just when Owan had lost him.
"As for reinforcement..." A glint of enthusiasm suddenly caught in his eye. He jumped up and hurried down one of the many cramped aisles of neatly stacked and towering bookcases.
Rathen smiled to himself as he disappeared, and abandoned his desperate attempt to recollect his words. His plan was working after all.
"There are a few tricks," his voice floated back towards him, "and for so...ambitious a spell, it might pay to try them all..." He reappeared with a particularly average-looking tome open in his hands and an absorbed pinch to his face. "You can make the spell stronger by being more precise - don't gloss over things, make it as detailed and tedious as you can, leave no room for error... You can also double-link the connections - but in such a complicated spell that might not be a wise idea, you might accidentally duplicate a command. Forget I said it... Weaving a reinforcement spell through their spines can strengthen the bonds, and if it's through the spine of the spell it won't muddy the chains themselves, it'll be like a shadow - unobtrusive but always present..." He fell quiet for a long moment and flicked back and forth through a few pages. "You could also try laying a more literal reinforcement spell into the object you plan to cast it into."
Rathen frowned. "That would work?"
"It should at least prevent degradation or loss of power if the spell does fall apart."
"...Like the Zi'veyn..."
"Yes." He closed the book.
After a silent moment of thought, Rathen discovered that his eyes had drifted onto him in another hesitant consideration, but one marked by a
personal dilemma rather than anything serious. He knew what was coming. Arator had given him the same look.
"Can I see it?"
He restrained his optimism and removed it from the bag. Owan reacted in much the same way as the grand magister had, though he took longer to probe the spell, and recoiled much sooner. He looked back at him in harrowed awe. "I can't believe you got this to work."
"That's a popular sentiment."
"How do you turn it on?"
"Uh...well you don't, really..."
He turned it over once more before his eyes slammed up onto him. "Rathen, this is a channelled spell. You have to fuel it."
"Yes..."
"It's an elven spell."
"What gave it away?"
Confusion further darkened Owan's eyes. "I...don't..." He fell back onto Anthis's notes in a frenzy, muttering incoherently to himself. He spoke up only barely. "You couldn't possibly fuel it with our kind of magic, not an elven spell...but how could you possibly bypass it? It's a rule of...of nature!"
"It was troublesome, I won't lie. Owan," he slipped around beside him while he continued his frantic debate and fixed him seriously. "I don't have the disposition to take this spell where it needs to go. Anthis Karth found and translated the elven notes, and I applied an arcane perspective to pull it all together, but that's all, and the remaining connections are beyond my capacity to make. I'm not like you, Owan, I took a different path. I have no interest in this kind of thing, nor the training or experience to see it through."
Rathen saw his thoughts finally slowing down, and a moment later he was staring back at him with equal severity. "I can see your angle, Rathen, but I can't take this off your hands."
Carefully, he steeled his frustration. "Why not?"
"Because the very utilisation of the spell is over my head! Notes or not, I can't work out how you managed to put this together in the first place!"
"Necessity had a large part. Look, you've only been reading over these notes for a few minutes--"
"We've been here for two hours."
"And how long is two hours in the grand scheme of things? You wouldn't grasp it in an instant, and yet you still managed to come up with some solutions--"
"I came up with suggestions--"
"And look at all the studies and references you have around you! Pair that with everything I've given you and you could have it down in a week."
"And destabilise the country in a fortnight."
His hopeful persuasion evaporated. The misery lines in his face deepened. "You wanted a solution to this catastrophe."
"Yes. And I dare say I've found one."
"And if you took it off my hands, it would all be done much sooner - but if it's left with me, there's no telling how far Salus is going to get nor how many pieces Turunda is going to be in by the time I finish it! Why are you looking at me like that?"
Owan's narrowed eyes harboured a shade of suspicion so powerful that, for a moment, Rathen's heart stopped. It took great trouble to force aside his instinctive defence and meet his stare levelly. Again, he knew exactly what was coming.
"There's been a change in you. Magically. Don't think I haven't noticed that you've still not explained it - and now I'm increasingly certain that it has to do with your operation of the Zi'veyn... Something has awakened in you."
He tried to suppress it, but Rathen couldn't keep his gaze from flicking just past him, nor the intolerant lick of fire from flaring within it.
Owan caught it and watched his jaw harden as a sudden charge coursed through the air. A charge made cautionary by nostalgia's warning.
With the slightest sigh, the studious mage's shoulders rounded in defeat, and he finally sat back down at the small, paper-strewn table, watching him with consideration. "Have you spoken to the grand magister about this?"
"Yes," he replied crisply. "I've told him everything."
"Everything? Or everything he needs to know?"
"Everything."
"And he's not changed his mind about detaining you?"
"No." Rathen returned at last to his seat, and the charge began to dissipate. "I have his support."
"Then I suppose I don't need the details. No matter how much it's going to scratch at me. But - and brace yourself, Rathen, because this is going to hurt - you are the solution to this catastrophe."
"No, no, I'm not. The spell--"
"The spell is impossible. And in your case, that should go doubly. And yet, somehow, I have this really quite...frightening confidence that it isn't impossible as long as you're involved. You've...you have grasped ideas that are beyond anyone in this place. Destroying magic? 'Killing' it, your notes say - it isn't a living thing! But...but somehow...your reasoning..." His eyes grew harrowed as his crisis of conviction set in deeper. "Even the notion of casting a spell 'bit by bit' is absurd! But the elves...they did do it, and...Vastal save me, somehow I think you could, too. Rathen, I can't take this off of your hands."
"But I don't want it."
"Yes, you do."
Rathen faltered. "What?"
"This spell could save everyone. It could stop Salus in his tracks."
"Yes, and that would remain the case whoever finished it."
"'Finished it' is the key phrase here."
"Yes, and anyone could."
"No, they couldn't." He sat forwards, his eyes blisteringly astute. It made Rathen itch. "Why is it so important that you get rid of this? It doesn't seem dangerous, just...impossible..."
"No, the spell isn't dangerous. But I cannot cast it. And even if I could--"
"Why not?"
"...I don't have the power."
"'Bit by bit'. But that's not how you said it." Owan's disconcerting speculation grew sharper, and Rathen suddenly felt as though he was training an arrow on him. "You didn't want to cast anything when we were coming in. Why? What's wrong?"
"Nothing - I'm just tired from all the travelling - and I simply mean that if I cast it, I stay in Salus's line of sight. I can't do that. I have a daughter and...it's too much responsibility. If it fails, it's on me, and there will be no one out there to pick it all up if I'm the only one who knows anything about it. That can't happen. I have to put her first. Anyone else can take my place - you could finish it, you could even be the one to cast it."
"Except I never wanted to be a hero. That was always your part to play."
The reminder stung no less from Owan. "I'm no hero."
He smiled sympathetically. "You're a soldier, Rathen; you're a hero in practice and in heart. You were banished, and yet here you are, out in the world, facing off against the most formidable threat in recent history, with a spell impossible even to conceive now near completion by your own hand. And for that reason alone, it could just work."
The room fell quiet. Candles flickered and lapped against the air, footsteps passed through the corridor outside, and the low, constant drone of city life hummed beyond the windows.
The chair creaked while Rathen leaned back in exhaustion and closed his eyes in defeat. Owan spared his old friend his gaze and traced back over the words of the open pages instead.
"I didn't want any of this," Rathen said, finally.
Owan looked up from the confusion on the page and gave him a sympathetic smile, though he stared now at the ceiling. "Yes, you did. You could have turned away, abandoned the matter, continued in banishment. But you didn't. Instead you stepped out here, with Aria in tow, to try to save all of us, even those who wrongly spurned you. You may wish you were a cynic, Rathen, but you're not. You're a romantic. A romantic with the perfect soldier's heart: devoted, responsible, enduring. Don't kid yourself. And don't insult me by trying to convince me otherwise." His voice remained soft, apologetic for the truth being what it was, but not for delivering it. When Rathen didn't look back at him, he leaned over, lifted a file box from the floor beside his seat and set it quite deliberately upon the table. "My apple for your pear?"
Rathen finally sat up, pulled by a reluctant curiosity
. "What have you got?"
"While you've been out there playing with relics and running away from ghosts, I've been working on the matter of magic and elements to the ends of stopping these chasms - the ones Salus isn't responsible for." He pushed the box towards him. "It might be a little more wordy than you're used to, but it could be useful."
"You've not really met Anthis yet, have you? What do you want from me?"
"You need to ask? You've been out there splashing around in it for months. People here are more than just a little hungry for information..."
A smile of disbelief suddenly tore across Rathen's face. "And you want to get ahead."
"Academia is a competitive world," he replied loftily, "but I'm hungry, too."
Rathen said nothing. He sat back in his seat and stared at him, one eyebrow slightly cocked, arms folded across his chest, and continued to grin like a viper.
Owan groaned painfully. "You're a wretched man."
"I know."
The curtains were drawn; candles flickered on the table in antiquated candelabra and the fireplace continued its quiet seething against the cold. Another steaming teapot sat upon the central table, and empty bowls and crumbs of bread were all that remained of a nauseously eaten supper. The endless wait had finally exhausted them.
Petra sat dozing on a sofa with Eyila curled up in a blanket beside her, Garon stared almost wild-eyed towards the door or out through the slightest gap in the drapes, and Anthis watched Aria toddle sleepily back towards him, her bag in one hand, dragging along the floor behind her, and her doll clutched absently in the other. He sighed sadly, both for her sake and his own. "Perhaps you should get some sleep," he said softly once again, trying to stifle a yawn, but she shook her head quite firmly.
"Can't."
"Aria, it'll be fine - he'll be back before you know it."
"In a few minutes, maybe?"
"Yes, maybe."
"Then there's no point in sleeping." She dumped her small bag on the table just in front of him, rummaged through, withdrew her wooden carving, shoved it into his hands, took a few sheets of paper then climbed back up into the seat beside him, pinning him under an earnest look with her tired, red eyes. "I need your help."
