Gruefield 18 (Tarnished Sterling Omnibus)

by Robert McCarroll

  "If I say I do want to learn magic from you, what does that entail?"

  "Until we reach a point where you can summon the energy to call me on your own, you would repeat the invocation of the existing enchantment on the mask to call me up. We would then proceed through a tutelary process at whatever rate is most suited to you. At its most fundamental level, magic is the control of energy through ritual and willpower. The source of this energy can vary, as well as the details of the procedure, but the basic component is always the same."

  "So, where does the energy you prefer come from?"

  "That particular answer requires a lecture on planar cosmology, and is irrelevant to the fundamentals. We should leave it for a more appropriate time."

  "All right."

  "People often say that faith is required to use magic. That is an oversimplification. When you are manipulating energy, you have to know with a certainty that what you are doing is going to work. You can't be lying to yourself."

  "But I wasn't certain when I called you up."

  "That was not manipulating energy. You triggered a spell someone else laid down. Baron Seven had already done the hard work for you."

  "Oh."

  "The other thing that is required to avoid mishaps is a complete control of your own mind. Certainty and mental discipline are the fundamental traits of all magic users. This means a lot of us will either be fairly wooden and stoic, or complete assholes. I am not so self-unaware as to not know which I am."

  "How do you teach those traits?"

  The Fifth Baron chuckled. "Now you see why the government keeps failing. There is no one method, nor will all methods work for any given student. The key is to start as young as possible. You are almost too old to bother. But, there's still a chance."

  "You make a great motivational speaker," Donny said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

  "As I said, there's no point in lying to you. Typically, a raw apprentice should not try to draw forth energy themselves. Simply put, it is frustrating and dangerous. You run too great a risk of damaging their certainty and ruining their chances of ever using magic. We cannot afford doubt at this stage. Instead, the master would call up a mote of energy that the apprentice would mold and sculpt, building up their control and honing their mental discipline. I can't do that for you, I'm too dead and the wrong kind of undead."

  "What are our options?"

  "The best choice would be to find one of your friends who can use magic and get them to be a surrogate for these exercises."

  "If we do that, why couldn't I just have them teach me?"

  The Fifth Baron sighed. "If you cut me out of the loop, you're dooming me to another few decades of haunting a piece of old ivory. Besides, I doubt they're true Necromancers. My knowledge of the dead is far superior."

  "I'd probably ask Jester of Anubis."

  "That old dog? You wound me," the Fifth Baron said, raising a hand to where his heart would have been. "But the other advantage to learning from me is that all I have is time. Once we're passed the stage where you need someone to conjure up motes for you, I am the better choice. Quite simply because I will never have anything else to do when you need me."

  "Put that way, you have a point."

  "Of course I do. Now, once we've found you a mote-maker, the first thing you have to practice is dispersing the energy safely. This process is both the foundation for the counterspell, and the safety valve in case something goes wrong with your own casting."

  Donny had never seen Jester of Anubis drive before, and was surprised that his metal, zygodactyl feet didn't have any difficulty operating the pedals. The elongated muzzle of his blocky, stylized jackal head pointed between the mirrors and the road ahead as his gaze darted between them. With the roof of the red convertible down, the wind had his normally upright ears flattened against his scalp. The dense mat of short black fur on his features was barely ruffled by the breeze. His emaciated arms shifted gears with an alacrity that made it hard to tell what Jester was keying off of. A plain black hero suit covered his body from the neck to the knees, where his spindly metal feet started. Over it, he wore an ornate bronze chestplate with a cartouche of hieroglyphs over his heart.

  "Why are you using a manual transmission?" Donny asked, trying to find something to fill the silence. He'd changed into his work attire, which was the jacket and trousers of a tuxedo over a black-and-white hero suit. He had a pre-tied, breakaway bow-tie about his neck and a white plastic copy of the skull mask on his face.

  "I learned to drive years before the automatic transmission hit the market," Jester said. "I never saw the point in changing." Jester downshifted as he bled off speed. Pulling to the side of the road, he turned down an unpaved drive.

  "Where are we?" Donny asked moments before they passed under a sign reading 'Sunshine Farms Petting Zoo.'

  "A petting zoo?"

  "Problems are not isolated to the bleak and dreary places of the world," Jester said, parking by the gate. A man dressed as a stereotypical farmer with denim overalls and a plastic pitchfork looked their way. He had thinning gray hair and a robust gut. Setting aside the fake pitchfork, he approached the gate. Jester hopped from the convertible without bothering to open the door. Donny exited in a more conventional manner. The farmer's eyes passed from one to the other and back again, uncertain of what to say.

  "I'm not sure I even expected anyone to show up," he said. "I'm Vernon Walentowicz. I also go by Farmer Wally if that's easier."

  "I am Sennofre of Waset, though I am commonly referred to as Jester of Anubis. This is Baron Mortis. He's not here to investigate your problem, but won't cause any trouble."

  "This has been a very strange day," Farmer Wally said. "Wait, I thought Licensed Heroes didn't give out their real names."

  "Do I look like I can maintain an alter ego?"

  "Good point."

  "Show me where the problem is."

  "It's in the barn." Farmer Wally walked towards a bright red structure with equally eye-popping white trim. As Donny looked around, it became clear that everything at Sunshine farms was decorated in a manner befitting a fairy tale caricature of a working farm. As they approached the barn, the claw marks in the door shattered the friendly facade. Vertical swipes of four and five parallel grooves bit through the paint and into the wood below. "The door was locked to keep the goats in, but the hay loft was open for ventilation. The doors were still locked when I came by this morning."

  Farmer Wally opened the door and the metallic aroma of spilled blood wafted out. Pooled blood and stained hay spilled between the scattered goat carcasses. Pink and raw red showed through rents in blood-matted fur. A few had been so badly mauled as to have spilled viscera on the floor.

  "I closed today because I can't have a scene like this greeting the children. Plus, I have no idea what kind of predator can go straight up a fifteen-foot-wall to get into a locked barn. Whatever it is, it might not stop at goats."

  "Permit me to investigate the scene," Jester said. "There may be something probative here."

  "Go right ahead. I'll wait outside."

  As Jester knelt down, Donny gave a polite cough. Jester looked up to see him holding the ebony box containing the original skull mask. "Right," Jester said. "Him." He barked out a mash of unnatural syllables and gestured with his right hand. A moment later, the shade of the Fifth Baron faded into view near Donny.

  "Ah, Sennofre, I thought I smelled wet dog."

  "While he may know a trifle about magic, do not take etiquette lessons from this man," Jester said, turning his gaze to the dead goats.

  "Just give us a mote and we'll stay out of your fur," Five said.

  With a snap of his fingers, Jester released a spark of golden-white light that floated and bobbed through the air. Donny stared intently at it.

  "Now, as we d
iscussed, you want to take control of the energy and safely release it into the environment."

  Donny nodded and continued to stare. After a moment, the mote blinked out. "Did I do it?"

  "No, it collapsed on its own. The very fact you had to question it means you failed. You will know when you have succeeded."

  Donny frowned. Jester leaned in closer to the nearest carcass, but snapped his fingers again, releasing another mote. Narrowing his gaze at the drifting fragment of energy, Donny extended a hand. The mote shifted color from golden-white to orange. Donny pulled back his hand and drew it in to float above his hand. "Yer mine," he said, a dopey grin crossing his features.

  "Yes, you have taken control of the energy," Five said, "But the goal was to dissipate it. You are only halfway there." The mote expanded and faded in intensity, becoming a diffuse orange cloud before vanishing from sight.

  "Did it."

  "Very good. Sennofre, another mote if you would be so kind."

  Jester stood and snapped his fingers again. "I know what did this," he said. Donny seized the mote much faster, dissipating it as he had the previous one.

  "Oh?" Farmer Wally asked, stepping back in. "What did you find?"

  "Take a look at this wound pattern." Jester pointed at the hindquarters of the goat where there were five round puncture marks. "You have an arc of four, with one opposed. What type of limb makes such a pattern?"

  Wally shrugged. Jester raised a hand as if holding an invisible brandy snifter, with four fingertips forming an arc and his thumb-tip opposite. "A person? What about the bite marks?"

  "We're looking at the work of a Therianthrope," Jester said.

  "A what?"

  "A were-creature. And before you say anything, Baron Five, I am neither confessing, nor am I a suspect. I lack the clawed fingers and the proper number of toes to have done this."

  "You're still a stick-in-the-mud," Five said.

  "Now that I know what I'm looking for, I'm going to see if I can track it," Jester said. With a quick utterance, his eyes glowed blue. Casting his gaze about slowly, he circled the interior of the barn. His eyes snapped upward and he scrambled up the ladder to the hay loft.

  "I doubt the perpetrator is upstairs," Five said, "So we're going outside to see where he hops down." Donny nodded and headed towards the door, Five in tow.

  "Wait a minute, I can see right through you," Wally said.

  "You're not phased by a dog-headed man with metal bird feet, but a transparent person throws you?" Five shook his head. "I do not get people."

  Donny circled around the outside of the barn in time to see Jester jump down. There were paw prints in the dirt here that didn't require magic to follow. Jester raced forward, vaulting fences with practiced ease. "Oh, come on," Donny whined, scrambling for a less direct, but easier route.

  "Perhaps we should have chosen a day when he was not in the field," Five said, drifting along after the mask to which he was bound.

  "Your memory must not be that great, because he doesn't have days like that," Donny said, finding a gate in the back fence. Jester was some distance off, heading down a wild meadow that sloped down to a narrow creek. Hopping the creek, he slowed enough for Donny to finally catch up, tugging at burrs that had snagged his trouser legs. Freed from the worst of the seed pods, Donny looked up. Before them was a wide maple tree with a thick trunk and wide-reaching branches. At its foot curled a girl in shorts and a loose T-shirt. She lay in a fetal position, her face hidden from view. She was caked in blood, her chestnut hair, shirt and arms were covered in it.

  Jester put out an arm and blocked Donny from rushing forward. "Wait here," he said. He snapped his fingers to release another mote and strode forward. Grudgingly, Donny caught the mote, but did not let it dissipate. It pulsated and spat even smaller sparks which orbited it like planetesimals around a minute star.

  Jester approached the girl and knelt down. Drawing back a matted clump of hair, he spoke softly. "Mercy, wake up." Her eyes fluttered open and she glanced up. Scrambling back, she ran into the trunk of the tree, gasping down a few panicked breaths. She visibly forced herself to calm down.

  "Why are you off your medication?" Jester asked.

  "I didn't like the side effects," Mercy said. "I thought..." Jester gently took her wrists and held up her bloodstained hands. "Oh God," she gasped.

  "You are on that medication for good reason, Mercy," Jester said. "The side effects are less horrific than the alternatives."

  "Whose blood is this?" Mercy asked.

  "You are fortunate that this time it was just a beloved herd of goats. But you know what could have happened."

  "I thought I could control it."

  "No one can." Jester gingerly picked up the barefoot Mercy and carried her up the hill. "You will have to apologize to the farmer and make amends for the damage you have done. Most importantly, you cannot go off your medication again. My forgiveness only reaches so far."

  "I understand," Mercy whispered meekly.

  "Oh, fun, we've found the culprit," Five said.

  "After we've gotten her home and medicated, I have a task for you."

  "Me?" Five asked.

  "Yes, something right up your alley."

  "I can't wait," Five said in an exaggerated, bored tone.

  "He's not dead," the Fifth Baron said. The pathologist looked up at the spectre and the two more solid figures flanking it. Donny sighed, his breath misting in the chill air of the morgue. The body on the slab was a lanky man of college age with a hole in the chest just too narrow to put a fist through. The pathologist was a short, rotund man with a lab coat and teal scrub shirt. He looked down at the body incredulously, then back up at the trio.

  "I saw him get impaled," Donny said. "I'm not sure how you can say he's not dead."

  "Look, I know dead," Five said. "That is kind of my area of expertise. That body can be revived."

  "How? The heart is shredded, and the consciousness is long gone."

  "Not that far," Jester cut in. "He's clanking around part of Tower Zero."

  "There's no way he's gone to haunting Sterling Towers," Five said.

  "I never said that," Jester said. "He's in a robot host."

  "Oh, that makes a lot more sense," Five said.

  "He's in this state because Fund security failed to protect him," Donny said. "If the body's not dead, we sort of owe it to him to try to fix the mess we made."

  "So now you believe me? That's a quick turnaround."

  "Shut up and think," Jester said. "What is keeping the Morlock on the slab from finally passing on? Is it the fact that his consciousness is in the form of energy being housed in a mechanical shell?"

  "No," Five said flatly. "It's almost certainly the cold and the lingering magical residuum." He made a noise as if sniffing. "Smells like electricity. It will fade with time, meaning the window to act is narrow. Albeit not as narrow as it would have been with a normal body."

  "You're sure of this?" Jester asked.

  "I would be hedging my statements if I had doubts."

  "So what do we do?" Donny asked.

  "What are you trying to do?"

  "Fix it."

  "The moment you heat it back up, the cells are all going to realize that there's no blood circulating and starve for oxygen. Then they'll die and start to rot. You have to fix the circulation problem as priority one."

  "Assuming we have a way to do that," Jester said, "How do we get the consciousness back inside?"

  "Beats me," Five said. "I don't know how it got out in the first place."

  "He was hooked to some sort of siphon that was draining off the excess energy he was producing," Donny said. "Since he arrived at Sterling Towers with that energy, he probably left through the same route."

  "I knew
this was going to be a strange place to work," the pathologist muttered.

  "Oh, come on, where else can you talk to several dead people at once and reasonably expect to get a response?" Five asked.

  "You do seem unusually talkative," Jester said.

  "I just spent the better part of a decade in a drawer. I'm going to take every opportunity I get to socialize."

  "I will find out if it is possible to modify the siphon to allow for bidirectional flow," Jester said. "That should permit us to get the man back in his own head."