by Thomas Locke
He and Connell climbed the circular stairs leading up to the ruined citadel, and Hyam tried to tell himself that the ladies were fine. The bird had told Hyam to come alone, but when Alembord asked to join them Hyam saw no reason to object. Connell took that as his cue and invited Fareed and the four senior mages along as well.
The stairwell was attached to the tower’s outer wall, such that it curved around a central open space. As they climbed, Connell explained this was an ancient battle tactic, as attackers fought with one arm hampered by the angled stone wall, and there was no central pillar to protect the oncoming men from mages positioned in the tower. But the tower was gone now, and above them the jagged stone frame was open to the sky.
The sun had just met the western hills when they arrived up top. They stood shoulder to shoulder about the rim, and Hyam tried hard not to fidget. He would give the eagle half an hour to appear, then he was off to find Joelle. Unless of course the ladies returned, and then he would willingly give the bird all night.
The city was at its most appealing now, the desert harshness and the age both softened. Smoke from a thousand fires rose like mystical pillars. Everything was golden, and all the mysteries were on glorious display.
Connell breathed in the countless sunset fragrances and confessed, “At times like this I could almost love the city.”
The wizard on Connell’s other side was an attractive woman with two silver streaks in her brown hair, like the one that had run down Dama’s back. “The instant you lower your guard, this place will strike.”
“No doubt, no doubt.” Connell grinned at her. “And then you would be promoted to chief wizard of Emporis and everybody would celebrate.”
“Mistress of acolytes armed with training spells and no orb,” she said. “Hardly something to look forward to.”
Hyam broke into Connell’s response by pointing at the sky. “Here comes the bird.”
The eagle was sorely displeased by all the people watching its arrival. The bird landed and fluttered about, its wingspan broader than Hyam’s arms. Reluctantly it approached and chattered, “I said come alone.”
“You did. Yes.”
“The master forbids this.”
Hyam had no idea what the words signified, so he merely gestured to the others and said, “These are friends. They need to bear witness.”
The bird squawked angrily and scrambled about the roofline, its talons scraping the tiles, cross as an old crow. Finally the bird said, “You are to come. The master awaits you beyond the yellow realm.”
Hyam translated for the others, who were both silent and agog. “What is our destination?”
“That is for later.”
“What of the dragon?”
“The master will decide what to reveal, and when.”
The nature of the speech, coupled with its newness, proved immensely frustrating. “I don’t understand.”
“Remember the treaty. Now you must hurry.”
“I . . . The caravan is not ready. We leave tomorrow.”
“The crisis is now.” The bird squawked for emphasis. “The master says he can heal your mate.”
Comprehension arrived in a panic such that Hyam did not even realize he spoke in the human tongue. “What has happened to Joelle?”
“The master says give your mate to the Elves for safekeeping.” Then the bird took flight.
21
Connell met up with them at the city’s main gates, where Hyam had come directly from the bazaar. The master mage had brought his entire company of wizards and acolytes, leaving the castle guarded by the Ashanta banker’s men.
Connell was puffing hard when he rushed through the gates. “I spoke with Trace through the communication portal. He will be ready.”
This was the news Hyam had awaited. “And Shona?”
“The earl prevailed upon his cousin. Trace added his own weight to the discussion. As did I. This is no longer about the father’s wishes. We spoke of battles that never end and enemies that have risen once more. Finally Timmins agreed. The lass is free to travel with your company.”
“Thank you.” Hyam returned his attention to Joelle. Her still form lay on the pallet they had used to cart her from the market. Shona and Meda lay on stretchers of their own, but they were recovering swiftly from their ordeal. Not so his wife. Joelle remained bound to this earth by the most fragile of threads. Her skin was cold and her features utterly still. The thought of leaving her in the care of others wrenched him painfully. But if he stayed, his wife would die. Of that Hyam was absolutely certain. Her only hope lay beyond the yellow realm.
Hyam stepped away from the city gates, faced the empty desert valley, lifted the crystal pipe to his lips, and blew once. The night was brilliantly lit by an almost full moon, the city ramparts utterly empty of life. Emporis was a city that survived by knowing when to hide. Not a soul was about this night, not a warrior nor a merchant. Everyone had heard of the attack in the bazaar, and all feared Hyam’s wrath.
But Hyam had no interest in revenge, and it was not the city that had wronged him. He would give in to anger and grief when time allowed. Just now he had a vital mission to perform.
A mist gathered by the southern ridge and spread swiftly across the valley, though there was not a breath of wind. The acolytes stirred and muttered, but Connell silenced them with a single word. Because of Joelle’s vulnerable state, Hyam needed their protection. Tonight he could not afford to take chances.
Hyam stood with the others and watched as the ghost troop formed itself into a double line that stretched to the glade at the vale’s opposite side. He recognized the officer who had met him earlier, the one Joelle had addressed, the one with whom he could no longer communicate. The commander unsheathed his translucent sword and pointed Hyam forward. The way was secure.
Hyam’s request to Trace was that he enter the forest glade beyond the Falmouth perimeter and create a magical storm. He had hoped the release of this energy would alert them to Hyam’s need. Somehow Trace had accomplished the impossible, for arrayed on the opposite ridge was a myriad of green-tinted flames.
The acolytes all held lights of their own, save those who supported the three stretchers. The valley floor was visible through the ranks of silent warriors. The ghostly soldiers faced outward, weapons unsheathed, as though expecting an attack at any minute. But the desert valley remained silent, empty, and free of all threat save the one they carried.
Midway across the rocky vale, Meda protested weakly, “I can walk.”
“As can I,” Shona said.
Hyam ordered, “Stay as you are.”
Elven warriors came down the slope. Hyam recognized their leader as the warrior he had addressed in their last meeting. Trace and one of Falmouth’s mage healers rushed forward and knelt beside Joelle’s stretcher. They were joined by a tall Elf, the first Hyam had ever seen who bore the stain of years.
The elder probed and muttered some incantation, but Joelle gave no sign she noticed anything. She had not moved since Hyam’s arrival at the destroyed shop. Shona and Meda both propped themselves upright now and observed the proceedings with alert gazes. Hyam tried hard to convince himself this boded well for his beloved.
Trace asked Shona, “Describe for me exactly what happened.” When she was done with the telling, Trace asked the Elf, “Have you ever heard of a mage being able to extract their own essential energy and fashion it into a spell?”
“Never,” the Elf replied. “And to do so without an orb bodes ill.”
“Such fell deeds signify a malignant being,” Trace said.
“Poisonous to the core,” the Elf agreed.
Trace lifted his gaze to Hyam’s company and asked, “Did you locate the vial holding Joelle’s life-breath?”
“Not yet,” Connell replied. “The mages are still sifting through the ashes.”
“Then we must assume the witch survived,” Trace said. “She has escaped, and she took the vial with her.”
“I agree,” Hya
m said, though it cost him three bitter breaths to form the words. “Can you cure her without it?”
The three rose slowly. The Elf replied, “We can make her rest easy. We can shield her from further harm. And we can wait.”
“And hope,” Trace added. “Whatever else can be done, will be.”
Hyam resisted the urge to fling himself once more upon the immobile body of his wife. “The eagle returned at dusk. It said the dragon could heal her.”
“Then you must go,” Trace said. “And swiftly.”
“How long do I have?”
The Elf moved in close enough for Hyam to read his grave concern. “We will do all we can. You must focus upon the quest, else all will be lost.” At a motion from the Elven healer, two guards lifted Joelle’s stretcher and started up the slope.
“Wait!” Hyam knelt by his wife’s side. His entire being was wracked by all he had not said, all the love he had not shown, all the incompleteness of his days. All the hours they could no longer share. All the love now stolen. He touched her face, cold as porcelain, and moved in closer still so that his ear rested upon her lip. He heard her faint breath and felt it rustle upon his skin. He rose, knowing that was all the hope this night would offer. That she still breathed.
They formed a silent procession up the ridge and discovered the Elven king and his queen standing by the glade’s entrance. Darwain greeted Hyam with, “Were it only a happier purpose that finally brings us together again.”
Hyam watched his wife vanish into the green realm and felt his life threaten to shatter.
The Elven queen stepped forward, gripped his face with both hands, and said, “We will do all we can for her, you have my word.”
The queen’s hands and gaze carried a burning current, strong enough to reknit the night and his world. Hyam breathed easy for the first time since coming upon his wife and the others. “I have something for you.”
He motioned to Connell, who stepped forward and bowed. Upon his shoulder was slung the leather sack he had brought from his study. Hyam accepted the pouch and untied the drawstring. As he counted out the ones he intended to keep, he described the merchant’s scroll and the spell and the event. By the time he finished with the telling, Trace had returned to stand alongside the Elven king.
Hyam fed some of the miniature orbs into Connell’s waiting hands, then offered Darwain the sack. “I’m keeping one for me, Shona, Fareed, and Connell. Another eleven to be held and used by the Emporis mages. That leaves fifteen for the Falmouth mages, and the same number for your kingdom.”
Despite the night’s somber events, Trace was so eager he almost danced in place. “May I, Your Highness?” When Darwain passed over the satchel, he drew out one miniature globe and held it up close to the nearest light. “Most remarkable. That explains many things.”
Darwain asked, “These are the same as our orbs?”
“These are said to hold a smaller charge and cannot handle the more potent spells designed for an orb,” Trace replied. “But they are nonetheless a source of power themselves. Any number of ancient scrolls speak of these, but most of my fellow mages treat them as myths, for none of the scrolls mentioned how they might be formed. Nor have I ever seen one before.”
“Which explains why our foe chased the merchant across the yellow sea,” Connell said.
Shona lifted herself to a seated position. This time, when Hyam ordered her to remain as she was, she ignored him. She pushed herself to her feet, then needed Connell’s assistance to remain upright. She said, “The witch said she worked for another. A master, she called him. She said the beast of Ellismere was his pet.”
Darwain said, “Describe the witch and tell us everything she said.”
When Shona was finished, the king and his wife exchanged a long look. Darwain said, “Our records of the first Milantian wars confirm much of what you say.”
“A few master mages,” the queen said, “accompanied by a crimson horde, and every soldier able to cast dark spells.”
Hyam slipped the tear-shaped stone from his pocket. “This one speaks to me.”
“And so it should. May I?” Darwain shared the gem with his wife. “This is the orb’s heartstone. Two of our own have survived the eons.”
His wife lifted up a hand to the moon and whispered a soft breath of music. The moonlight coalesced into a sliver that spun into a thread, and the thread became a band thin as a needle, yet intricately woven. She continued singing as she settled the heartstone into the band.
Darwain’s smile was both sad and joyful. “The last time I heard that song was at our marriage feast. New crowns are spun from moonlight by each new generation of rulers.”
Still his queen sang. The threads shimmered as they weaved about the stone, forming a nest of silver light. She sang as she reached out and fitted the band to Hyam’s head, such that the stone nestled at the center of his forehead. “That is how one carries the heartstone.”
Hyam protested, “I do not care to wear any crown.”
“None will see this unless you choose, and you will never notice its presence. Only its power, and only when you draw upon it.” Darwain tilted his head just a fraction and touched his forehead with one finger. The moonlight coalesced, revealing a thin band of woven silver and a tear-shaped gem nestled upon his forehead.
Hyam started to object a second time, though he could no longer feel the crown’s presence. But the Elven queen halted him with, “Who can say what trials await you in the treeless realm?”
Darwain reached out a hand. “Give me those orbs you intend to keep for yourselves.”
When Connell passed over the smaller sack, Darwain handed it to a pair of elders. They swiftly stepped into the glade, then returned holding sticks the length of a man’s forearm. They spoke in a cadence that formed the Elven plainsong, and gradually the wood became engraved with elaborate script. The tips grew wooden fingers that reached out and gripped each orb in turn.
When Darwain gave them back, he spoke with the formality of an incantation. “Wear them as your swords, wield them with care, take the battle to the enemy, fight the good fight, and survive.”
22
The first five days of their desert trek proved such a brutal trial Hyam could not even name which part of his body hurt the most. The heat was fierce, but worse still was the animal’s uneven gait. The desert beast was lumpish and ill-tempered. Whenever Hyam tended it, she would snap at him. She groaned and she spat and she stank. Hyam’s thighs became so chafed they blistered and bled. By the end of each day, his bones ached. Meda and Alembord and Shona were similarly afflicted. Each evening, the caravan’s drovers found great mirth in watching them dismount and stretch and groan.
His first two nights on the road, Hyam limped away from camp and opened the box given to him by the merchant who had yearned to follow the wizards’ path. The countless years had worn the exterior wood smooth. The box contained a simple ceramic bauble. Upon its creamy surface was painted a myriad of symbols that might have been Milantian script, but they flowed together in a pattern that left Hyam uncertain of their origin or meaning. At the center of this circular script was an eye. It seemed to glow in the moonlight, as though lit from within. The gleam strengthened as he studied it, until Hyam found himself able to leave behind the trek and the worries and the heartache. He plunged into its depths. And he remembered.
The bauble would not allow him to move forward, just as the merchant had said. But memories took on an astonishing clarity. He remembered with vivid detail whatever he called to mind. The love and the loving, the laughter, the feel of Joelle’s arms, the scent of her breath. It was all his once more.
But when he drew away, the world and Joelle’s absence attacked him.
Hyam knew the bauble held an addictive force. The memories were too perfect. Nothing unpleasant was contained in these recollections, not even the distress he had known over losing his magical abilities. Within the eye there was only the good, only the pleasurable, only the allure that dr
ew him further and further into its depths.
On the third night, Hyam resisted the urge as long as he could. Then he limped over to where Meda slept, gave her the box, and told her to keep it from him and never open it herself.
Theirs was the only caravan departing Emporis for the yellow reaches. On their ninth morning outbound from Emporis, Selim took his tea and cold flatbread with Hyam’s group, offering fragments of desert wisdom to this heartsore stranger and his small company. “Winter is the time for such treks. Only because of these strange orders do we venture now, in the approach to high summer. Soon the yellow realm will be struck by winds so fierce the sand will etch flesh from bones, and then turn the bones themselves to more dust. And the heat will grow worse still. Either we reach our destination soon, or we and the animals perish.”
They slept the brief period permitted them, then rose while the moon was still a tight sliver to Hyam’s left. Dawn was another three hours away. They traveled until the heat made each breath a struggle. At midday they sheltered and rested, then ate a cold meal and trekked through the sunset and into the night. Hyam welcomed the uneven rhythm, the fog of fatigue, the pain. It gave him something concrete to struggle against. It would do until their true foe was revealed.
After another brief night, Selim again joined them for the pre-dawn meal. As they stood around the cook fire, Selim demanded, “Tell me, stranger. Why do you suppose the enemy attacked your mate and not you?”
Hyam saw the rage spark in Meda’s gaze and knew she was ready to bark at the drover, both for his question and his tone. Hyam held up his hand, silencing her. He merely gave voice to the thoughts he carried through each day. “The enemy attacked my weakest point.”
Behind them, drovers prepared the caravan while the beasts protested with their brassy moans. Selim studied him intently, clearly not expecting a direct answer.
