But Damir liked it best when Maura talked. She mainly told him stories about the other villagers: who she had traded food with; who had been rude to her and what she had said back; the foolish, everyday acts that went on; who was having a hard time and what she did to help. Damir would sit there, half listening, but also just watching her. He gazed at her expressions as she told her stories: her frowns, grimaces, and her laugh. He noticed how her hands waved around when she was particularly animated about a topic. Damir knew he was falling in love with her. He had no idea what to do about it—how to proceed—whether she had any feelings for him. But he didn’t really mind. He was just happy to sit in the same room, listening to and watching her, until Maura decided that it had got too late. They went to bed on their straw mattresses, on opposite sides of the cottage. Damir would close his eyes, think about how he would approach the Portal the next day, and he would go to sleep happy.
It was on the sixth day that Damir’s progress on his task came to a halt. It was not the magic; he had identified and removed every spell laid on the Portal he had come across. It was a few words. They had emerged in the surface of the rock the previous day, after he had unlocked one of the most challenging enchantments. It had taken a lot out of him and he had knelt in the ground, catching his breath, when he noticed the words appearing slightly above his eye line:
* * *
The Portal demands a sacrifice of the blood of the beloved
* * *
He had run through the line endlessly yesterday and again this day, but could not make out the meaning of it. There seemed to be no obvious riddle in it and he could detect no magic involved either. The words just stared at him from the rock. For hours he stared back. Then he gave up.
Frustrated, Damir made the journey back down towards Berva. It was only mid-afternoon, but he hoped that a change of scene might help. He walked along the track that led into the village. The end of the track joined the village road and as he got closer he noticed a man on horseback, looking in his direction. Damir walked over while the man waited for him. He got very close until he realised, with a start, that it was his teacher, Maelgwn. He had been the dominant figure in Damir’s life for the last five years and yet Damir had not recognised him. Berva had become like another world to the Sorcerer’s Palace in Noriburg. But, of course, it wasn’t another world at all. The only reason he was here was because Maelgwn had sent him and the old man’s presence was a sharp reminder of that reality.
“Damir,” said Maelgwn, his voice like grating stones, his eyes piercing and sharp, as if they were trying to cut a way through Damir’s body to look at his soul.
“Master,” acknowledged Damir, lowering his head.
Maelgwn took his time to say anything further and Damir waited in silence. “How does it go at the Portal?”
“Well, sir, at first it went well but I have now…become stuck on the task,” Damir admitted candidly.
He looked up to see the sorcerer’s response, expecting anger or some such emotion. Maelgwn, as ever, tried to hide his emotions but Damir knew him too well for that. Maelgwn was pleased and there was something else. Relief?
He wants me to fail, Damir realised.
“Well, you do not have long to correct this, Damir. In three days you must appear at the Sorcerer’s Palace with proof that you have unlocked the Portal.”
That was all Maelgwn said, there was no “or else…” But Damir didn’t need telling what the consequences of failure would be. The Sorcerer’s Palace wouldn’t allow a failed novitiate with significant magical power to go wandering around the world, stuffed full of their secrets. If Damir didn’t complete this task he would be tracked down and killed.
“I suggest you get back to your work instead of wasting your time around here,” said Maelgwn reprovingly. The sorcerer nudged his knees into the flanks of his horse and was on his way, travelling back to Noriburg. Damir watched him go. He turned around to head back to the Portal as he had been told. But he caught himself.
What’s the point? he thought to himself. I can’t stare at those same words for the rest of the day.
Damir carried on to Maura’s cottage. He hoped, he almost prayed that she would be there. He needed her to chase away a growing sense of despair. She was there, her back to him as she prepared the food for the evening’s meal. She turned around with a gasp when he entered the cottage.
“Damir! What are you doing here? You gave me a fright.”
“Sorry,” said Damir, grinning. He then lost his smile. “I—the Portal. I’ve got stuck on it. I don’t know what to do—”
“Oh, I see. Well you can come and help me peel vegetables then,” she paused. “You saw my father?”
“Your father?” said Damir, shaking his head. “No, I—”
“Maelgwn.”
“Maelgwn?” No other name would have shocked him more, and yet when she said it he somehow knew it must be true.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Maura shrugged. “I promised not to. I’m his sinful error. You must know sorcerers are not allowed families. He keeps me here, away from Noriburg, but close enough for him to visit and keep an eye on me.”
“Your mother?”
“She died six years ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you. Here, you can do these carrots.”
They worked in silence for a while, as Damir processed the new information and Maura allowed him to.
“Your father told me I have three days to open the Portal. If I don’t…”
“You will, Damir. I know you will.”
“Maura, I’ve got to tell you something. This time I’ve spent with you, I feel—”
Maura put down her knife and put a finger to his lips. Damir stopped talking. With her other hand she brushed his cheek, held his neck and pulled him into her. They kissed. Damir’s heart was racing as the restraint they had both shown until now was swept away. Maura led him over to her bed. She undressed, showing him her body. Breathless, Damir did the same.
They made love in Maura’s cottage. Damir finally said what he had wanted to say, “I love you.” He then began to cry.
Maura didn’t tease him; she lay with him and stroked his hair. But she didn’t understand why Damir cried.
At last, he understood the words on the Portal.
* * *
The Portal demands a sacrifice of the blood of the beloved
* * *
Maura was the beloved. Damir loved her. So did Maelgwn. This was the real task that had been set—a test of loyalty, not magic. Damir had to kill Maura to open the Portal. By doing so he would prove that his loyalty to the Sorcerer’s Palace came above everything else. The sorcerers had decided that Maelgwn would have to lose his own daughter to make this point. A sacrifice given by both master and student. No wonder he had looked relieved when Damir told him he had got stuck.
Damir cried. He felt sick to his stomach. He knew that if he refused he was as good as dead.
In the Sorcerer’s Palace in Noriburg, Damir knelt in front of Maelgwn the Sorcerer. He presented him with a chalice, a chalice that he could only have obtained by opening the Portal at Berva and therefore completing his final task. Both men knew it meant much more than that. Damir could see it on Maelgwn’s face as he struggled to control the shock and the grief. They waited in silence for a while.
“Stand, Damir,” said the sorcerer, his voice firm and unwavering. “You have successfully completed your final assessment. You are now a Sorcerer of the Palace. You are one of us. My brother.”
Maelgwn strode over to Damir, gripped his shoulders and gave him an embrace. He then pulled away; all emotion gone. No questions about Maura.
“We will arrange chambers for you. There is much for you to do; you will be kept very busy. Someone will call for you when we are ready to tell you more.”
Damir left the Palace and headed into town, feeling lightheaded. Maelgwn had lost a daughter and gained a brother. And he had accepted it.
But that was not something Damir could ever accept. He entered the stables of the inn. Maura was where he had left her. She was still very pale; very weak; but alive.
Once Damir had realised the situation he was in, he knew he had to act fast. If Maura hadn’t agreed to the plan he would have gladly gone to his death. But she agreed. So over the next three days Damir bled her. He bled her like his father had shown him how to bleed a cow or a horse all those years ago in the steppes of Azaria. Opening a vein in her neck, he would quickly seal it again before she lost too much blood. Maura lay on her bed and he cared for her, gave her plenty to eat and drink. He would then go up to the Portal and splatter it with Maura’s blood. How much of her blood did it want? Deep down, he knew it would be a lot. He let her rest and recover and then he would take more. It was not until the fifth time that it worked. The door receded and Damir entered a tiny chamber where the chalice was waiting for him.
“How was my father?” asked Maura.
Damir shrugged. “Upset at first. But he accepted it.”
“So you have been accepted as a sorcerer?”
Damir nodded.
“Then you should stay here, Damir. It’s a great honour.”
“Thank you for saying that. But we’re not staying in this place a moment longer.”
Damir helped Maura onto her horse and mounted his. He led them out of the town, through the same gate his mother had taken him through all those years ago.
He now realised that he owed his mother his life. Magic was forbidden in the steppes but as Damir got older the signs were there to see. His father grew angry and bitter towards him; started beating him. Others in the tribe became suspicious. Damir wasn’t sure what price his mother paid to leave the camp in secret with her son, in the dead of night, and take him to safety. He had been so full of anger towards her he had blinded himself to the truth. She had taken him to the best place she knew, where he would have the greatest chance of survival. She had done all she could.
As they left Noriburg, Damir and Maura turned around to give the town one last look.
“They will find out what happened soon,” said Damir. “But if they want to find us they will have to look for us in the steppe lands.”
“If they do find us?”
“Then I’ll be waiting for them.”
BONUS 1: PREVIEW—OG-GRIM-DOG: THE THREE-HEADED OGRE
Og-Grim-Dog: The Three-Headed Ogre is the first book in the Me Three series.
The first two chapters are reprinted here.
AN OGRE OF THREE HEADS
It was night-time at the Flayed Testicles. Drinking time.
Conversation swirled around the inn, laughter erupting from one corner, dark and secret mutterings in another. Men and women talking and drinking, with nowhere better to be and nothing better to do. You could say it was an inn like any other in the land of Magidu.
Except for the landlord.
Tea towel permanently draped over one shoulder, he was the oil that kept the wheels turning, serving food and drink with cheery amiability, a dirty joke for the women and a wink for the men. Respectful yet familiar; controlled yet approachable. And no-one ever tried to make trouble in his inn. For he was an ogre, and he was an ogre of three heads.
It could have been awkward addressing an ogre of three heads. Which pair of eyes to look at? Use one name or all three? But this ogre insisted on being called Landlord, and Landlord only. And if you called out this name, then invariably you found three pairs of eyes all looking your way, each head giving you their undivided attention.
And so it was that this night, the regulars called out this name, a name that was not really a name at all. No longer demanding to be served his ale, though that would continue to flow all night, never fear. They demanded something they had found to be even more valuable, and something never watered down, either. They called out for a story. For, in the quiet and peaceable backwater that was Magidu, they loved a bloodcurdling story, and no-one told a story quite as peculiar, or marvellous, or chilling, as the Landlord. The Landlord’s stories were outlandish, outrageous, preposterous, completely unbelievable. Yet, when he told them, the Landlord’s customers all agreed it sounded like he had been there himself. This, they would tell each other, is the mark of a truly great storyteller. Not to mention, with three heads, he was very good at doing all the voices.
The conversations died down, the anticipation heightened. The Landlord took his time wiping down the bar, letting the tension build as all great performers know to do.
But this night would be different from all the other nights.
It wasn’t because of the Landlord or his regulars. It was because of a newcomer.
Sitting at the table at the front of the inn was a small, bespectacled man. His clothing was old-fashioned and worn-looking. It had the effect of making him look older than he really was.
As the Landlord wiped at his bar, getting ready to begin, he couldn’t help but notice that large segments of his audience were distracted. People were gesturing at the man on the front table, a quill in one hand hovering over a piece of parchment, apparently ready to record whatever words might be emitted from the Landlord’s mouths.
The genial mask slipped somewhat.
‘What are you doing?’ asked one of the heads.
‘I intend to record what you say,’ answered the man matter-of-factly.
‘Why would you do that?’ asked a second head.
‘Because I know who you are. You are Og-Grim-Dog.’
Gasps erupted around the inn. A name—they had a name. No longer the Landlord, this ogre was Og-Grim-Dog, one name for each head, together forming a whole.
‘You must have me mistaken,’ said the second head.
‘Mistaken?’ asked the man, the pitch of his voice rising at the end of the word. ‘How many three-headed ogres are there?’ he said, a little smugly.
‘You’d be surprised,’ suggested the third head.
‘Come on,’ said the man in a chiding voice, wafting his quill at the ogre. ‘You are Og-Grim-Dog, infamous across Gal’azu.’
The regulars at the Testicles muttered at this. Had their Landlord really come here from Gal’azu—the dangerous, edgier province to the east? Could it be? Could it be that his stories, so fanciful and fantastical, were episodes from his previous life?
‘Everyone in my homeland knows at least one story about your exploits,’ continued the newcomer. ‘But I have travelled here to find out the truth. To sift the facts from the fabrications, to peel back the layers of myth-making, the exaggeration and the misrepresentation; to record for posterity, what really happened. Once I have done my work, broken in and bridled the fable with my tools—this quill, this ink, and this parchment—I will have copies made and distributed, so that all may know the truth of it.’
‘You dare to make such a claim?’ demanded the Landlord’s first head, in a deep growl of a voice that none here had ever heard before. The ogre before them seemed to grow, and the Testicles shrank. As if awakening from a stupor, or a spell, they could see the hard, grey skin; the giant teeth; the thick black hairs sprouting from knobbly warts. And it was only then that the regulars of the Flayed Testicles recognised their terrible folly, of frequenting an inn owned by a three-headed ogre.
‘You, with your puny tools, a feather and a small bottle of ink, will break and shackle our legend? We are Og-Grim-Dog! We have been loved and reviled! We have been the Hero of the Hour, the Darkest Villain, and everything in between! We have saved this world and travelled to worlds beyond it! We have deployed weapons of death beyond your imagination! They have called us The Destroyer! The Unclassifiable! We graduated top of our class in Rhetoric! We once shagged a—’
The second head coughed. ‘Remember, we agreed not to mention that,’ it said under its breath.
‘Oh yes, sorry,’ replied head one. It turned back to the man, a mean and fiery look in its eyes. It opened its mouth, revealing its teeth, each the size of a human’s hand. It made its hand into a
fist, the size of a human’s head. The newcomer crumpled under the glare and the hostility and the threat of imminent, bloody violence. ‘You think you can distil the life of Og-Grim-Dog into some words on a page?’
The inn became silent. It was the silence of a question left hanging in the air.
‘Maybe,’ squeaked the man.
The silence transmuted, to the sound of the Flayed Testicles holding its collective breath. They hadn’t come out tonight to watch a man be torn apart and eaten in three separate, ogre-sized mouths. Having said that, it would be something to tell the grandchildren…
‘Very well,’ said the ogre, in a surprisingly calm voice. ‘You accept the challenge. But know this. Failure on your part will result in not only your death, but the death of every man, woman and under-age drinker in this inn.’
A third silence. The silence when everyone thinks to themselves, I could have stayed at home tonight.
‘Agreed,’ said the stranger, apparently entirely comfortable about risking the lives of all present.
The regulars of the Testicles stared at the man with antipathy, but he seemed oblivious. He dipped his quill into his ink pot and held it at the ready. ‘Where shall we start?’ he asked.
‘Let’s start in the middle,’ suggested the ogre’s third head.
‘Why the hell would we start there?’ demanded the first head angrily.
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