The Unwelcome Warlock

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  You will have food for three days, she said, speaking without sound. The water of the stream will be pure and clean. Because humanity must rely on itself and not upon gods, this is all I will give you until a year has passed. And before that year has passed, you will repay this by giving comfort to one who needs it — a blanket to one who has none, a roof to one who needs it for a night, or a meal to one who has not eaten that day.

  Then she was gone, and an excited babble ran through the throng. As he listened, Hanner realized that every person there had seen the goddess as standing before him or her, and addressing him or her directly. And as he looked around, Hanner saw that a cloth-wrapped bundle lay in front of every person in the crowd, including himself. He knelt down and unwrapped his.

  The brown stick-things inside were unlike anything he had ever seen before, but when he took a wary nibble of one, he found it tasted sweet and perhaps a little nutty, and had a consistency something like a syrup-covered biscuit. He took a larger bite, chewing carefully. Then he swallowed, and called to the theurgists, “Well done!”

  Alladia waved an acknowledgment.

  “Well, at least we won’t starve,” Sensella said from behind his right shoulder.

  “Not for three days, anyway,” Hanner agreed. “But we’re still stranded out here in the hills of Aldagmor, and if there were ever any roads around here, they’ve had thirty years to fade away.”

  “We can find our way by the sun,” Sensella said. “If we head south, we’ll reach civilization eventually.”

  “I’m not worried about the direction so much as the terrain,” Hanner said. “What if we need to cross rivers, or climb mountains?”

  “Then we’ll wade, or swim, or climb. Hanner, we all thought we were doomed. We thought the Calling was a death sentence, but here we are alive! We have a second chance. We may have to struggle to get there, but we can all go home again, to stay.”

  Hanner looked around at the mobs of people.

  “Then what?” he said. “There are thousands of people here! And I’m sure many of them don’t have homes to return to. You said it’s been more than thirty years since the Night of Madness. Even those of us who came later can’t go back to our old lives; we made our living off our magic, and now that’s gone.”

  “We’ll manage,” Sensella replied. “We have our lives back. Yes, we have problems to overcome, but we have our lives back.”

  “Not all of us. I don’t know how many people were crushed to death in that pit, but —”

  “Yes, they’re dead,” she agreed, a trifle impatiently. “But we aren’t. I’ll see my children and grandchildren again. Don’t you have any family back home?”

  Hanner swallowed. “My wife. Mavi. We have three children — but it’s been seventeen years. They must be grown by now. They must think I deserted them.”

  “I’m sure they understand about the Calling,” Sensella said.

  “Maybe.” He looked around at the crowds. Most of the former warlocks were eating the divinely-provided food. Guardsmen had returned from the stream and were distributing drinking water in their helmets. The skies had brightened enough that they no longer needed torches for light. “What if we followed the stream south?” he asked. “Then we’d have drinking water for the journey, and it must empty into either the Great River or the sea eventually.”

  “Good idea,” Sensella agreed.

  Hanner looked east, where the sun was peeking above the horizon. “We should make a start soon. Walking will help people keep warm.” He remembered the dozens of injured the witches were tending. “The stronger men can help carry anyone who’s too badly hurt to walk.”

  “You think all of us should stay together? I don’t think the Sardironese or the Srigmorans will want to go south.”

  “I’m not going to force anyone,” Hanner said. “I couldn’t if I wanted to. If they want to go north or west, let them, but I intend to head south, and I expect most of the others will, too.”

  Sensella did not argue further.

  Hanner raised his arms and shouted, “Hai! Everyone! We have food and water now, but we can’t stay here! We need to get back to civilization. I’m going to follow that stream south, toward Ethshar.”

  “What about the priests?” someone called. “They’re still chanting!”

  Alladia heard this, and hurried toward Hanner. “They’re still trying to summon Tarma,” she said. “Give them another few minutes.”

  “I want to finish eating,” someone called.

  “I’m too tired, I need to rest a little more.”

  “It’s still too cold!”

  “Let the sun get above the trees, so we can see.”

  Hanner grimaced. “Fine!” he shouted. “Fine! Half an hour, and then we go.”

  That seemed to meet with general acceptance, and Hanner settled to the ground, cross-legged, to wait.

  As he sat, he wondered what had become of Mavi. Was she still living in Warlock House, the mansion that had once belonged to Hanner’s uncle Faran? Probably not; after all, she wasn’t a warlock. He had owned the house, and she was his heir, but the Council of Warlocks might not recognize that.

  Perhaps the Council had acknowledged her ownership and paid her rent. Hanner hoped so. He had not left her wealthy; so much of his money had gone toward that ridiculous tapestry and its useless refuge that Mavi would have been far from rich after his departure. He hoped she had been all right. He had a sudden, horrible image of her and their children camping in the Hundred-Foot Field and shuddered.

  But surely his sisters would have looked after her, if only for the sake of their nieces and nephew. Mavi might be living in the overlord’s palace, as a guest of Lady Alris, Hanner’s youngest sister. Mavi and the children should be all right.

  But he wanted to get back to them and be sure. Sitting on the trampled grass was not getting him any closer to seeing them.

  Finally, he looked at the sun, well above the horizon, and decided he had waited long enough. He got to his feet and was just about to call for attention when someone screamed behind him.

  He turned, startled.

  Then there were more screams, and fingers pointing at the western sky. Hanner heard the word that was being screamed, and his blood went cold even before he saw what those fingers were pointing at.

  It was unmistakable, and he added his own bellow to the screams.

  “Dragon!” he cried. “It’s a dragon!”

  Chapter Six

  Lord Sterren, Regent of the Vondish Empire, was taking a morning stroll on the battlements of Semma Castle, looking out toward the Imperial Palace, when a movement in the northern sky, far beyond the palace, caught his eye. He raised a hand to shade his eyes and peered into the distance.

  There were several flying objects out there, dark shapes against the blue sky — more than several; scores, maybe hundreds. They were too far away to make out details, and the lack of a background made it impossible to judge their precise size or distance, but they did not move like birds and were not proportioned like birds.

  There were too many to be dragons — or rather, if they were dragons, the whole World had gone mad. Which was not impossible, but it seemed unlikely, and they didn’t look like dragons.

  They looked like people. In fact, they were coming rapidly nearer and looking more and more like people with every second.

  Flying people meant magicians, and not just any sort of magician — herbalists and ritual dancers couldn’t fly, so far as Sterren had ever heard. Demonologists only flew when carried by demons, and besides, Sterren doubted there were that many demonologists in all the Small Kingdoms. There were a few other unlikely possibilities, but the odds were good that these were either wizards or warlocks. Or both.

  Either one would be bad news. Both would be very bad news.

  Warlocks were banned from the Vondish Empire. A delegation from the Wizards’ Guild had made that very clear twelve years ago. If these flying people were warlocks, their presence in the Empire amoun
ted to a declaration of war between themselves and the Guild. Sterren really, really didn’t want to be anywhere near a war between a hundred warlocks and the Wizards’ Guild. He had seen a war fought with magic when he first came to Semma — in fact, he had been the one who brought the magicians into it. That had been a very small-scale affair, fought by some of the least-powerful magicians available, and it had still been frightening. He had then seen Vond build the empire, which had been awe-inspiring. Both of those conflicts had only had magic on one side, and they had been quite ugly enough. A war of warlocks against wizards would be very bad.

  If these were not warlocks, but wizards, then the question was, why would they be coming here, to the southern edge of the World? Why would they be flying, and by themselves, rather than on carpets or the other aerial vehicles wizards generally favored? Why would there be so many of them? When that Guildmaster, Ithinia of the Isle, had delivered the Guild’s ultimatum, half a dozen wizards with their feet on the ground had been more than enough to cow the entire empire.

  But then a thought struck him; flying people meant magic, yes, but they didn’t all have to be magicians. Many of them might just be passengers, carried along by the magicians. That might not be so bad, then. Perhaps these people had offended a wizard somewhere and were being sent into exile here in Vond.

  Somehow, Sterren doubted the situation was that benign, but it might be. His luck had often been excellent. Really, with few exceptions, he had been fortunate ever since he tricked Vond himself into making himself susceptible to the Calling. Yes, the Imperial Council had insisted on naming him regent and had refused to let him leave and go back home to Ethshar, but he had long ago gotten used to his position. He was happily married, with five healthy children; the empire was doing well and had managed to avoid getting into any border wars for more than a decade.

  He very much feared, though, that his good fortune was coming to an end. He turned to the stairs and shouted down to his guard, “Send word to convene the Council, and put the entire garrison on alert!” He looked back over his shoulder at that cloud of people and added, “And see what magicians are in the castle — I want to see whoever’s available in the throne room immediately!”

  Then he trotted down the stairs, bound for the Imperial Palace, still trying to guess who these aerial travelers might be.

  If it had been just one man, there would have been an obvious, if nightmarish, possibility. There was a reason Sterren’s title was regent, rather than emperor. There was a reason he didn’t live in the Imperial Palace. Officially, the Vondish Empire still belonged to the Great Vond, the warlock who had been Called to Aldagmor almost fifteen years ago; Sterren and the Council were just looking after it until he returned. That was generally considered a polite fiction — but maybe it wasn’t. No warlock had ever come back from Aldagmor, but Vond had done a good many things no one else had ever done. He had found a way to draw warlock-like magic from a source in Lumeth, as well as the one in Aldagmor, and had used the magic to build his empire. There had never been another warlock like him.

  If one warlock had appeared in the sky, Sterren would have thought it might be Vond.

  He shuddered at the very idea. Vond had never really intended to be cruel or destructive — indeed, he had for the most part been a beneficent tyrant and had significantly improved the lives of the common people of the eighteen kingdoms he conquered — but he had a temper. A bad temper. Sterren still remembered the sight of poor Ildirin’s mangled corpse — Ildirin, the butcher who Vond had brought from Ksinallion to be one of his palace servants, had spilled wine on his master, and the warlock had smashed the unfortunate man against a stone wall, then crushed his skull, all without touching him.

  And worst of all, Vond had then carried on the discussion as if nothing untoward had happened.

  Vond also had grandiose ambitions. He had built the Imperial Palace by magically reshaping the bedrock, deliberately making it larger and grander than Semma Castle, but that was the least of it; he had lit the night sky for miles around, he had turned up a chunk of the earth itself to make a barrier at the edge of the World, he had done any number of spectacular feats, merely to show that he could.

  Only when he realized that he was still susceptible to the Calling, despite drawing his power from a different source, had he stopped looking for bigger and bigger ways to display his magnificence. Instead, he had huddled in his palace, trying to use no magic at all, until one night he had flown off to the north, never to be seen again.

  Vond had known Sterren betrayed him, but had done nothing about it, because Sterren was the closest thing to a friend he had, and the only other person in the empire’s capital of Semma who understood anything about warlockry. He had needed Sterren. But if he came back…

  But this wasn’t just one warlock; there were dozens of people flying.

  The possibility that they were all warlocks who had somehow learned to use the Lumeth source occurred to Sterren, and he almost fell down the stairs at the mere thought. One such warlock had reshaped the Small Kingdoms; what might scores of them do?

  But how could anyone else have tapped into the Lumeth source? No, that didn’t seem very likely. The Wizards’ Guild wouldn’t allow it.

  He paused on the third floor of the castle to catch his breath, call a few more orders, and take a look out a north-facing window.

  The flying people had arrived more quickly than he had expected; they were already settling to the ground in Palace Square, while the capital’s inhabitants made way and stared in astonishment.

  One of them, though, was not descending with the others; he was hanging in the air above the great doors of the Imperial Palace. He was tall, thin, and pale, and wore a black robe embroidered with gold. Sterren felt his throat tighten and his stomach knot. It had been fifteen years, but he remembered a robe like that.

  That had been what Vond wore.

  Sterren reached out and opened the casement just as the apparition began to speak, and even though he was at least half a mile away, Sterren could hear every word — the warlock was using magic to amplify his voice.

  “People of Semma!” the flying man said. “I, the Great Vond, have returned! I have come back from a far realm to resume rule over my empire! Let the word be spread from Quonshar to Ksinallion that I am here!”

  “Oh, this is bad,” Sterren said. Vond was back, and judging by his words, as egotistical as ever. But how was this possible? He had been Called, and no warlock ever returned from the Calling.

  Or at least, none had until now.

  Sterren turned away from the window and found two of his personal guards standing in the passage. “You, Bragen,” he said. “Go find Lar Samber’s son. Whether he likes it or not, he’s about to come out of retirement; I need to talk to him as soon as possible. Do whatever it takes to get him to come; he probably won’t want to. Threaten him if you need to.”

  Bragen bowed. “Yes, my lord.” He turned and hurried away.

  Sterren looked at the other guard. “Noril, go find Princess Shirrin and as many of my children as you can, and tell them to get out of the castle and away from Semma as quickly as possible. Go with them. Head for Akalla. If they can get to Ethshar, so much the better. Travel anonymously — you understand?”

  Noril hesitated. “I…I think so, my lord.”

  “Don’t just think so! That’s Emperor Vond out there, and if he loses his temper and doesn’t like what we’ve done with the place since he left, this whole city may be a hole in the ground by tomorrow, and I don’t want my family here if that happens.”

  Noril bowed hastily. “Yes, my lord.” Then he, too, turned and hurried away.

  Sterren forgot about his dignity as regent and ran for the stairs; he had to get to Palace Square at once. It was certain that Vond would want to see him, and keeping the warlock waiting was never a good idea.

  Fifteen minutes later he trotted out into the plaza to find Vond waiting for him, hanging a foot or so off the ground. A mob of
strangers and townspeople lined the sides of the square, but had left a wide berth around the warlock.

  Most of the strangers, Sterren saw, wore black clothes — that probably meant they were more warlocks.

  That was very, very bad.

  Sterren was unsure just how best to greet the emperor, and decided not to go to either extreme; he stopped perhaps eight feet away and bowed, but did not kneel or otherwise abase himself. “Your Majesty,” he said.

  Vond stared at him for a long moment, then said, “Sterren? Is that you?”

  Sterren straightened up and looked Vond in the eye. “Of course it’s me,” he said.

  “You’ve changed.”

  “It’s been fifteen years — and I notice, your Majesty, that you haven’t changed. Frankly, that comes as something of a surprise.”

  Vond smiled crookedly. “You didn’t expect me to come back at all, Sterren — you know it, and I know it. You don’t need to pretend.”

  “I wasn’t pretending, your Majesty. You’re quite right, I didn’t expect you to come back. How did you manage it? Who are these people you brought with you?” He gestured at the surrounding strangers.

  “They’re warlocks,” Vond said. “Or at least, they used to be.” He smiled unpleasantly.

  “Used to be?” Sterren asked. “I take it there’s been some drastic change in…well, in something?”

  “Oh, yes, there certainly has.” The smile broadened to a grin. “The Calling has ended, Sterren. Ended.”

  That raised a great many questions, but Sterren settled on one to start with. “Ended? Permanently?”

  “Oh, I think so, yes. The thing that was doing the calling, that was the source of warlockry, that fell out of the sky on the Night of Madness? That thing? It’s gone. It went home.”

  Sterren considered that for half a second, then asked, “You don’t expect it to return for a visit, then?”