The Only Wizard in Town

by Heide Goody

  “I don’t see the difference,” said Bez, crawling to the next set of holes. “Magic. Natural philosophy. What makes rocks fall to the ground if not some form of magic?”

  “It is the earth breathing in,” said Cope, speaking in grunts as she struggled through the forest of spikes.

  “The earth is doing what?” said Pagnell.

  There was a loud and piercing crunch from several points along the tunnel. Bez turned awkwardly in the rapidly shrinking space to look back. Spikes which had been pulled out of their vertical alignment by Cope no longer matched up to the corresponding holes. They pressed against the floor and, for the time being at least, stopped the stones’ descent.

  “Oh, gods, you’re a genius,” said Pagnell.

  “I didn’t know if it would work,” said Cope.

  The bracing spikes creaked and groaned in a way no metal should.

  Pagnell attacked the holes with his half spear with renewed intensity. Bez did the same. “We can do this,” he whispered to himself.

  Cope, who had nothing to jab into the holes (the ceiling was too low for her to use her sword) worked herself backwards to get out of their way. “Bon Jowen, the Carian philosopher, told me the world, which is a living goddess, breathed out life in one long breath and is now breathing in again,” she explained. “It is the breath of the earth which sucks all objects downwards.”

  A trapped spike screamed and buckled. Another three followed in quick succession. The ceiling dropped a hand’s span, pushing Bez flat in a crawlspace no higher than that under the house he grew up in. He had to turn his head sideways to stop his chin being crushed.

  “Oh, this world sucks all right,” he said, somewhere between a gasp and a sob. He rammed his paintbrush down the point of a spike and into a hole and wiggled frantically.

  “Can’t breathe,” grunted Cope.

  Pagnell flailed. Bez couldn’t see but something very much like a boot slapped into his side.

  “Keep … keep…”

  The paintbrush wouldn’t come out of the hole; there wasn’t enough room. Bez would have screamed but there was no room in his lungs either. “I’m really not happy about this at all,” he whispered.

  There was click in the floor beneath his pinned ear. Slowly, but decidedly, the ceiling lifted. Bez didn’t say anything, didn’t dare hex things with shouts of relief or disbelief. He lay there until Pagnell put a hand under his arm.

  “We did it.”

  “We did?”

  “One of us did.”

  “Yeah,” said Bez, dazed.

  There was room for them to manage a stooped walk. Bez let himself be guided forward, stepping over the wobble stones to the far end where Lorrika was already at the now open door.

  “Found it,” she said, pointing to a hole in which the half a grimlock spear was firmly wedged.

  “That was close,” said Cope, flexing her shoulders.

  “Well done on the trick with the bent spikes. Kudos,” said Pagnell. He held out a fist to her. She looked at it.

  “I don’t know what you expect me to do with that,” she said.

  “Does no one do fistbumps round here?” said Pagnell and shrugged. “Look, there’s the fourth threshold!”

  Back down the corridor, there was torchlight.

  “Grimlocks. Oh, grand,” said Bez.

  They closed the door behind them. Bolts thunked into place and the machinery of the trap began to lower the ceiling again. It was a glorious sound to Bez’s ears, if short-lived. There was a click, the grinding ceased, and the door unbolted itself. Lorrika pushed the door closed again, firmly. Thunk, clunk, grind, click. The door unlocked again.

  “I’d wager we’ve permanently disabled the Vice of Infidels,” said Pagnell.

  “Which means?” said Bez.

  “We run. We run quickly.”

  Bez found himself being dragged along the tunnel. With every stride, he felt the growing wrongness of it all. Treasure and professional curiosity be damned. He would trade it all for a tankard of Old Pentacular.

  7

  In the gloom, Bez stumbled on the bottom step. He hadn’t been counting but they had descended for what felt like a long way. The dying torch Pagnell carried was illuminating nothing now but itself. The hollow echo of their footsteps told him they were in a large open area, but even Bez’s keen vision could make out little of the dark space around them. Apart from a flat stone floor and some long lumpy shapes lying on the ground ahead.

  “What is this place?” asked Lorrika.

  Pagnell had slowed to a walk and was pointlessly attempting to look through his remaining sheets and notes. “I genuinely have no idea. We’ve lost the diary of Handzame the Unlucky, along with half of Abington’s journal.”

  Cope dropped to her knee beside one of the shapes on the floor. It was four feet long and a lumpy lozenge shape.

  “Careful now,” said Bez. “That might be one of them poisoned sausages you warned us about.”

  “It is clearly too large to be a sausage,” said Cope. She dug her hands into its bobbly surface and ripped it apart. “Besides it appears to be made mostly of hair and fur and bone.”

  “You’ve obviously never ordered the market-day special in the Kidgate Tavern,” remarked Lorrika.

  Bez crouched beside Cope. It was indeed made from pieces of fur and fibres, wrapped around fragments of bone and other hard materials. It was as if the contents of a town ditch had been scooped out and left to dry in the sun. There were dozens of them, in various stages of dusty decomposition.

  “I got nothing,” said Bez.

  Cope pulled out a long piece of bone. Bez was no anatomist, but guessed it might be a human thigh bone. Cope wrapped a bundle of matted fur, straw and thick cobwebby stuff around the end of it before lighting it from Pagnell’s torch. It burned brightly.

  She nodded in approval, then put her torch to one of the nearest lumps. It caught in an instant.

  There was now light enough to properly see the square hall. Walls, ceiling and floor were of blocks of cleanly cut stone. There were – Bez was pleased to see – no spikes, pits, suspicious holes or obvious traps. He was less pleased to see (and he spun round three times to be certain) there was no other exit from the room. There were the dozens of strange dusty lumps on the floor. There were a number of huge pots or urns along the walls to either side. There was, on top of the steps at the far end, a large lump of stone, which may once have been a carved statue, eroded by centuries of wind or rain.

  What wind? What rain? thought Bez. “I have a bad feeling about this,” he said aloud.

  “That’s just your inner pessimist talking,” said Pagnell, standing on tiptoes to peer into one of the stone urns.

  Cope dismembered another dry husk with some gusto. She removed a short blade and a helmet and chucked them onto the floor. The helmet bounced with a dull clang.

  “We need to equip ourselves,” she said.

  “We need to get out of here,” Bez pointed out.

  “Working on it,” said Pagnell, exploring the hall.

  Lorrika pulled apart one of the lumps and retrieved a short-handled axe and a handful of coins. “Score!” she said, pocketing the money.

  “Definitely not a thief,” commented Bez.

  “It’s unlucky to leave coins lying around,” she replied. “Well known fact.” She spared the mound another glance. “Don’t spiders wrap their prey up in cocoons like this?”

  Bez jumped back, his eyes scouring the ceiling for monstrous spiders. When it was clear there were none, he pretended he had done no such thing.

  “This isn’t the work of spiders,” said Cope.

  “And you’re the expert, are you?” said Bez.

  “There’s no flesh in these. No meat. No digestible materials.”

  “Enough with the sausage theory.”

  “It’s just twigs and bone and metal.” She took out a curved section of worked metal armour and brushed it off. Sorcerous runes were worked into the material. She pu
lled out a larger piece, a black chest plate, also covered in arcane symbols. “Is that—?”

  “—Amanni armour,” said Lorrika.

  “Maybe you’ve found the final resting place of Handzame the Unlucky,” called Pagnell from where he stood at the base of the eroded carving.

  “Don’t spiders suck all the juicy goodness out, leaving a dry husk?” said Lorrika.

  “This isn’t just one body. This is all mixed up, like it’s been eaten, digested and spat out,” said Cope.

  “Ancient dried out poop?” said Bez. “Call me old-fashioned, but not my idea of treasure.”

  “It’s like owl pellets,” said Lorrika. “They throw up whatever they can’t digest.”

  “Either way, that’s totally horrid.”

  Cope shushed him.

  “What?” he muttered.

  She shushed him again and tapped a finger to her ear. They listened. They all heard it. The approach of gibbering creatures, the flap of feet, the ringing out of weapons.

  “Poop indeed,” said Bez.

  “You’d think they’d give up,” said Lorrika.

  “Possibly too stupid to give up,” said Pagnell. “We need to mount a defence.”

  Cope scanned the room. “At the foot of that rock thing. Everyone arm yourself.”

  “I’m a painter, not a fighter,” said Bez.

  “They’re going to kill us if we don’t fight them,” reasoned Cope.

  “I have built my reputation as an objective observer. I’ve got to maintain some impartiality.”

  “Then you’re going to be an impartial corpse.” Cope rammed a dust-covered short sword into his hand and propelled him towards the eroded carving. As she ran, she put the torch to as many of the dried lumps as she could, creating an obstacle course of bonfires.

  The rock they gathered around was shaped like a crab’s pincer: a high, round-backed central piece curving down at each side, more notably to the left. As the grimlocks bounded into the room, Bez prudently sheltered in the crook of the left hand curve.

  “Gods, why are there still so many of them?” he whimpered. “Are they breeding as they go?”

  “Rabo Poon had a philosophical theory about that,” said Lorrika, drawing the axe back to throw.

  “I really don’t care,” said Bez.

  He clutched the sword he’d been given but no real intention of using it. He had his own philosophical theory, this one about weapons and fighting. The brainless grimlocks of the Clodhopper tribe wore feathers in their heads on the basis feather-wearers were rarely found among the battlefield dead. Bez knew what kinds of people ended up dead in battles: the ones carrying weapons. Especially the ones who thought carrying weapons would save them. Bez might as well throw the sword aside, pull out his charcoal and paper and just draw what would undoubtedly be his final masterpiece.

  The grimlocks yowled in fury as they saw their enemies. Lorrika let the axe fly. Bez didn’t see where it went but he heard a hearty thunk and splat. Cope gave a roar and ran at the grimlocks, sword swinging. Pagnell took up a position on the arm of rock just in front of Bez and let loose with his soporific spells. Bez captioned the scene in his mind. The battle of the idiot warrior, the delusional thief and the bloody dentist.

  Bez turned away, closed his mind to it all, and looked at the stone formed around him instead. It wasn’t a natural formation, he could see that much. There was deliberation in its contours; an almost, well, shape – as though it was ready to burst into some recognisable form. Like the sculptor’s block, if one could just chisel away that which wasn’t right, a pre-existing form would be revealed beneath.

  Cope yelled. Grimlocks screamed.

  Bez put his hand to the rock. It yielded to his touch. The filth of centuries fell away and revealed the dusty reality beneath. A series of branch-like rods with finer rods running off from them in tight rows like the needles of a fir tree or—

  “Feathers?”

  Pagnell looked down at him from the top of the dusty pile. “Stop hiding! Do something!”

  “Um…”

  Bez gently levered himself away from his safe spot and looked carefully. Yes, from the angle of the feathers, that would be the neck, that dirt-covered block could conceivably be a curled up talon and – he followed the shape round – therefore that protuberance Pagnell stood on would have to be the head. And the beak. Tiny puffs of air appeared just to the side of Pagnell’s feet. It’s breathing! his mind yelled. How come no one saw it was breathing?

  “Oh, crap,” said Bez softly.

  “Do something, man!” shouted Pagnell.

  “I am doing something. I’m being quiet and so should you. Move away. Quietly.”

  An arrow flew past Bez and embedded itself in the mound; the body. “Please don’t,” he squeaked. In a moment of terrified madness he found himself trying to shush the arrow.

  At the centre of the melee, two grimlocks threw themselves at Cope. She eviscerated one with a sword swipe and tossed the other away. It collided with the bird’s head, just below Pagnell’s feet.

  An eye opened: black in a circle of gold.

  “And Buqit came down from the abode of the gods in the form of the giant eagle Tudu,” Bez whispered.

  “What?” said Pagnell. It was all he had time to say.

  The enormous eagle reared, flinging Pagnell backwards. It shook itself out, driving who knew how many years of rock dust and muck from its body, creating a choking cloud which obscured everything for a long and dreadful moment.

  As the dust settled, the silhouette of Tudu loomed, larger than a house, wings wider than ships’ sails. Humans and grimlocks alike had seconds in which to re-evaluate who they were fighting and whether fighting was going to do any good. Bez had already come to a solid conclusion on that point.

  He ran.

  A beak descended out of the dust and swept his legs from under him. He stumbled and rolled over one of the eagle pellets on the floor: the remains of one of the beast’s ancient meals. Tudu stepped forward and shrieked. The god-eagle’s cry was the screech of a thousand battle horns. Bez could see himself reflected in the black pools of its eyes. He was a tiny, miserable dot, and he knew he was about to die.

  A grimlock spear rebounded off the bird’s flank.

  Tudu screeched, turned and snatched up the offending grimlock in its sharp beak. Grimlock weapons were thrown, Tudu rounded on the throwers. From the floor, Bez could see Lorrika caught in the middle. She tried to get clear, sidestepped the swipe of a grimlock knife and, her back turned, was knocked to the ground by a savage blow from the eagle’s beak. A talon came forward to rake her like a worm teased from the ground. Cope ran in and chopped at the raised claw. Her blade slid off the gnarled yellow hide, but it was distraction enough for Lorrika to roll away. The two of them were still beneath the creature’s breast, surrounded by a confusion of battle-ready grimlocks.

  The great stone hall, the billowing clouds of dust, the low and filthy grimlocks, the mighty monstrous Tudu, the two women, bloodied and about to die. It was a magnificent scene, and it was a crying shame Bez couldn’t record it while fresh, so to speak. Unfortunately, he was almost entirely out of sketching paper and he couldn’t remember where he’d put his charcoal. He’d just have to remember it as best he could and paint it later.

  Bez kept low. He was prepared to pretend to be a corpse if anyone so much as looked his way. He was a short sprint from the entrance and he doubted Tudu could squeeze through there. No – there was another exit from the room: a similar doorway, in the far wall. The bloody bird had been curled up asleep in front of it. Was it luck? Chance? Or a bloody smart feeding strategy? It didn’t matter; Bez had no thoughts of heading that way.

  “Here! Over here!” Pagnell had stripped off his outer coat and was waving it around to attract Tudu’s attention. The mammoth eagle turned to charge him, its tail swinging like the stern of a racing ship: sweeping aside any in its path.

  Cope helped Lorrika up and shouted to Pagnell. “What’s the
plan?”

  “Plan?” said Pagnell. “Well, I do have this pouch and—”

  Tudu lunged at the wizard. He barely jumped back in time.

  “Birds of prey,” he said. “They’re very good at spotting movement.”

  He swung his coat back and forth, the eagle’s head followed it: left and right. Pagnell hurled the coat to the side as high and as far as possible, immediately standing perfectly still. The eagle’s head followed the coat’s trajectory to the ground. Tudu looked at the coat for a second and, unimpressed, back at Pagnell.

  “Bugger,” said the wizard very quietly.

  One of the last remaining grimlocks attempted to spear Cope’s back while no one was looking. How she saw it coming, Bez had no idea. Nonetheless, she sidestepped the thrust and gave the grimlock a hurt look.

  “Sethit tan,” it said, as though that made it all okay.

  Cope slapped it aside with the flat of her blade and ran to assist Pagnell. Bez could see it was too far to run; she was too slow. Tudu snagged the wizard by the shoulder and tossed him screaming into the air before catching him in its open mouth. The eagle gulped. The scream died.

  Cope yelled. The bird turned. The giant warrior did not hesitate. She leapt high and brought the sword round, over her head. Feathers sheared away, snapping like saplings in a storm. Tudu’s head reared angrily before it lunged at the warrior. Cope’s sword met its beak and bounced off. Tudu screeched – it didn’t like food which fought back – but Cope stood her ground. Lorrika scurried in from the side, a bundle in her hand. Underneath the monster’s head she ran, swinging up and over, and dropped the dead wizard’s tattered coat across Tudu’s eyes.

  Tudu froze for a second. With a small exhalation it relaxed into a roosting position, stock still. It made some small, breathy sighs and settled slightly, as if ready for sleep.

  Bez couldn’t believe it. “What the…?”

  Tudu’s head turned sharply to face him.

  “Damn.”

  It took a step forward.

  Cope shuffled out of its way. The massive head turned blindly, head cocked. Cope stopped moving. The bird tilted its coat-draped head from side to side, listening with whatever passed for bird’s ears. Cope remained still. Tudu screeched in her face. Cope held her nerve. She was brave, Bez had to give her that, although brave really was just another word for stupid.