The Price of Magic

by Wesley Allison

  “He threatens great destruction.”

  Tokkenoht reached past Kendra and shoved the human. He crashed into the wall and slid down to the floor. She had heard that some of the humans were fierce warriors, but this was not one of them, she decided.

  “Ask the other three if there is anything they need.”

  “They say they need more food,” Kendra translated. “They say we feed them only half of what they need.”

  “That is probably true,” said Tokkenoht. “They are warm-blooded and so their bodies need more fuel. Tell them we will have more food brought.”

  The high priestess turned and waited for the cell door to be opened. Once it was, she stepped out, followed by the other females. The guard stepped out as well, shutting the cell door behind him. The three queens made their way up the hallway.

  “That was not particularly useful,” said Tokkenoht. “The humans chatter like birds, and they make just about as much sense. Don’t bother me with them anymore.”

  “As you wish,” said Szakhandu.

  “Where is the king?”

  “He is in the throne room.”

  They walked through the palace and entered the throne room from the side. Guards lined the walls. The king was on his throne. Ssu was sitting on the dais at his feet. Kendra took her place next to Ssu, while Tokkenoht and Szakhandu sat down in the chairs on either side of the throne. In front of the king was a line of lizzies waiting to be heard. The first was an old grey fellow.

  “Great King, I am Tsollot. I have been hut elder for many seasons, but now I am alone. There is no one else in my hut, and I am too old to catch and tame a youngster.”

  “I know you Tsollot. You came from Ussus, where you were once a great warrior. Is that not true?” The old lizzie nodded, and Hsrandtuss continued. “What is it you would have from me?”

  “I am old. I cannot hunt for myself? If you know of a hut that I may join, I would hear of it. Otherwise, I ask for a swift death.”

  “Since before the time of Setemenothis we have lived with huts of eight to ten,” said the king. “Now we are raising our own young, so I don’t know what our huts…” He looked down at Kendra. “What is the human word I want?”

  “Families,” she said.

  “I don’t know what our families will look like in the future. I can only suppose they will be larger. Right now, my hut has only six—my five wives and me. We will need someone to remind us of the old stories. You will join my hut. You will eat with the king. You will sleep by my hearth.”

  The other lizzies in the room hissed in approval.

  “Thank you, Great King.”

  “Ssu, see that his things are brought to the palace. Tell Sirris to get him the softest sleeping mat. Then rub him with oil.”

  Ssu jumped to obey and left the throne room with Tsollot. The next lizzie in line behind him stepped forward. He was a large male, perhaps the same age as Hsrandtuus, and like the king, marked from many battles.

  “Great King, I speak for more than five thousand of our people.”

  “Indeed,” said Hsrandtuss. “Then you should first speak for yourself. What is your name?”

  “My name is Skarguss.”

  “Greetings Skarguss. What is it that so many of my people have sent you to ask of me?”

  “We ask, Great King, for you to release the humans. We do not want a war with the soft-skins. They are like a nest of hornets. Step on one and the worst that can happen is a sting. Stir up their hive, and they can kill you.”

  “I do not need lessons on humans,” snapped Hsrandtuss. “I know how to deal with them, and I will release the human prisoners when I am ready, and not before.”

  “Hear this, Great King,” said Skarguss. “This time we ask you. Next time we will tell you.”

  “You won’t tell me anything if I pull out your tongue by the roots!” shouted Hsrandtuss, starting to rise.

  Szakhandu put a hand on his shoulder and he settled back down into the throne.

  “Know this, Skarguss. I am the king. I will not put up with disrespect, no matter how many people you think you speak for, and now matter how many mouths you speak out of. Get out of my sight!”

  Skarguss hurried from the room and was replaced by yet another supplicant.

  “Hail, Great King,” said the newcomer, a female, trembling slightly.

  “I have duties elsewhere, my husband,” said Tokkenoht, leaning toward Hsrandtuss.

  He waved her off without looking at her.

  “What is it you want, female?” she heard him ask the lizzie before him, but left the room before she heard the reply.

  Returning to the hearth room, Tokkenoht took a long bath, removing the simple paint that Szakhandu had applied earlier that morning. Once she climbed out, with the aid of one of the servants, she applied her full coating of blue with yellow symbols. Donning her blue cape once again, she left the palace and climbed into her sedan chair. The four white-painted males lifted her up and carried her through the streets.

  When they reached the temple, Tokkenoht did not immediately ascend the stairs of the pyramid. Instead she walked around the base to the acolytes’ dormitory. Opening the door and stepping inside, she found Zzixxon and Szoryat resting on their sleeping mats. Zzixxon jumped to his feet. Szoryat stared at him for a moment, as if wondering what he was doing, before turning and seeing the high priestess. Then she jumped to her feet as well.

  “I am sorry to disturb you,” said Tokkenoht.

  “We are at your service, as always, Revered One,” said Zzixxon.

  “Thank you. Would you please go bring all the others to the annex? I need to speak to everyone.”

  Zzixxon bowed and hurried out the way that Tokkenoht had come in. The high priestess walked across the room to exit out the door on the far side. Szoryat fell in behind her. They stepped out into a small garden and crossed to a larger building just beyond.

  “How are you finding Yessonarah?” Tokkenoht asked the other female.

  “It is a great privilege to be here.”

  “That is most definitely true, but that does not quite answer my question.”

  “I find life here most pleasant.”

  “Good.”

  Inside the annex was a large meeting room, with seating for up to a hundred lizzies. They didn’t as yet have need for that many seats, but they might in the future. When Zzixxon returned with the other acolytes, the conclave numbered only twelve, Tokkenoht included.

  The high priestess waved for the group to sit down, and then she walked to the table at the front of the room. Pushing aside several artifacts, she sat on the edge of the table and looked down at her congregation.

  “It is time to select the first priests. I shall select two, and they shall alternate. One day one will be senior and then the next day the other. This is the way the great temples have always operated. As we build additional temples in Yessonarah, others will be elevated to priesthood. The priests’ decisions will carry the weight of law within the temple and may only be contradicted by me, or of course, Yessonar himself. I will select the priests, but I will listen to your recommendations first.”

  “Oreoluss would be a good priest,” said Zzixxon.

  Several others hissed in agreement.

  “Zzixxon is a good choice,” said Szoryat.

  Zzixxon flushed his dewlap, but there didn’t seem to be as much agreement as there had been for the first nominee.

  “Xiasasatt,” said Oreoluss.

  There was a hiss of disagreement from a few others.

  “Anyone else?” asked Tokkenoht.

  No one else spoke.

  “Very well. Oreoluss will be the first priest, and Szoryat will be the second.”

  Several heads bobbed in surprise.

  “You are just picking Szoryat because she is a female!” shouted Zzixxon.

  “Yes, that is correct,” said Tokkenoht. “Almost two thirds of the population of Yessonarah is female. She will see that they heed the guidance of the god
, as will you all. Now, the rest of you return to your duties.” She pointed at Oreoluss and Szoryat. “You two come with me.”

  As the other acolytes filed out of the room the way they had come in, Tokkenoht led the other two up a flight of stairs to a large room—humans might have called it an office, since it had a table and chair that resembled a desk, but the lizzies didn’t have a word for such a room. Along the side wall, was something like a cabinet, but unlike the human furniture, this was made of solid stone and was a part of the very structure of the stone building. Two wooden doors had been hung with leather hinges to form an enclosure.

  Tokkenoht opened them and carefully removed a large scroll. It was four feet from top to bottom, wound around a spindle of highly polished cedar, with decorative finials of gold at the top and bottom. When completely unrolled, it was more than forty feet long, crafted from the hide of a single extremely large tyrannosaurus. At more than one hundred pounds, it was a chore even to lift it, but she carried it to the table and laid it down, unrolling it enough to expose about eight feet. The interior of the scroll was filled with pictographic writing.

  “This is a copy of the Holy Scroll of Tsahloose. It tells the story of the gods and our people, all the way back to the beginning of the fourth age of the universe.”

  “Can you read it?” asked Oreoluss. “It doesn’t look like the writing I know.”

  “You will be able to read the newest writings, the ones near the end. The further back you go, the more difficult it will be. But the further back you go, the greater will be your power. Which ever of you is senior priest will serve in the temple, supervise the acolytes, and see to the people. The other will be in here, studying the Holy Scroll.”

  Tokkenoht spent the remainder of the day touring the temple. She spoke to each of the remaining acolytes and then met with a dozen prospective acolytes from among the many new arrivals in the city. She dictated a list of the construction projects still needed for the complex and gave orders on how they should be completed. Finally, she met with a number of sick and injured lizzies in the temple hospital and performed healing spells on many of them.

  As evening was approaching, the high priestess climbed into her sedan chair for the trip back to the palace. They had almost arrived when Tokkenoht heard shouts ahead. She signaled her bearers to set her down, jumped out of the chair enclosure, and hurried to the palace, and up the steps. It was quickly obvious what was happening. It was a coup attempt.

  Hundreds of lizzies were engaged in hand-to-hand fighting. It wasn’t always easy to tell the two sides apart either. The palace guards wore necklaces identifying them, but they were a small thing to spot, even if they hadn’t fallen off during combat.

  Tokkenoht raised her talisman and chanted, “Uutanuhn, uutanuhn, uutanhn.” Three magical missiles shot from her upraised hand and unerringly found three enemies, killing them.

  “Come with me,” the high priestess ordered the men who had been fighting the now dead foes.

  Her bearers picked up weapons from fallen combatants and followed along too, leaving the others to continue fighting all around the great building. As she hurried around the back of the palace, she and her followers quickly dispatched half a dozen enemies, gaining half a dozen more for her makeshift army. She somehow expected to find a great battle in the garden, and she realized that she had just assumed the whole thing was about the offspring. There were many who didn’t agree with the new way of raising children at home. But with the exception of Ssu, no one was there.

  “Wife of my husband, what is happening?”

  “I don’t know,” answered Ssu. “It was my turn to watch the offspring. I heard sounds and I didn’t know what to make of it. I sent Shaksa to see what was happening, but she never returned.”

  “You two,” said Tokkenoht pointing at two of the palace warriors she had collected. “Stay here and guard this female and the offspring. If anything happens to either, I will flay your skin from your living bodies.”

  With the remaining males in tow, the high priestess hurried toward the interior of the palace. As they passed through the hallways, they found numerous dead, but no more living combatants. Finally, they entered the throne room.

  The great room looked like a slaughterhouse. There wasn’t an inch of the floor that wasn’t covered in blood. Bodies were everywhere. There were less than twenty lizzies still fighting. Four palace guards were facing off against twice that number in the center of the room. Near the dais, Hsrandtuss, covered in gore, with a spear stuck through his thigh, was fighting six males. He was swinging his sword with almost unimaginable speed, bearing down on his enemy. But when he did so, the others would attack his sides or back.

  Forgetting both her talisman and her magic, Tokkenoht went running toward the king, scooping up a sword from one of the bodies on the floor. With a strength she didn’t know she had, she buried it into the head of a male, whose attention was totally upon her sovereign. When he fell, she almost fell with him, but managed to pull the weapon free and swing it into the side of another warrior. Unfortunately most of the obsidian blades were gone from her weapon and it did little more than knock the wind from his lungs. Just as he turned to look at her, a spear thrown from behind pierced his neck. The warriors arriving with the priestess had jumped into the fray, and they quickly turned the tide. Within minutes, all of the enemy fighters were dead.

  The far door burst open and Attarkakhis ran in, sword in hand, followed by two dozen warriors.

  “Secure the throne room!” shouted Tokkenoht, just as Hsrandtuss dropped to the floor.

  Hurrying to his side, she ran her hands over the king’s body, looking for injuries. There were plenty there to find. Half a dozen sword gashes oozed red blood. She broke off the shaft of the spear sticking out of his leg, but didn’t pull out. Hsrandtuss struggled against her for a moment.

  “Calm, my husband,” she said.

  “Tokkenoht?”

  She saw that both of his eyes were obscured by blood flowing into them.

  “Yes, Great King, it is I. Do not struggle. You are safe.”

  One of the white painted bearers knelt beside the high priestess and handed her the lizard talisman, which she had dropped earlier.

  “Uutanuhn, uutanuhn, uutanhn,” she chanted, eyes closed, hoping for all the healing energy in the universe to flow into her husband’s body.

  Examining him once again, she saw that the worst wounds had stopped bleeding.

  “Bring me healing salves!” she ordered whoever was close by.

  “Tokkenoht,” said the king. “See to Szakhandu.”

  The priestess looked up toward the throne and saw her fellow wife on her knees, her head resting in the throne’s seat. A spear was embedded in her side. She waded through the bodies on the floor to reach her, but stopped short. There on the floor, was the diminutive form of Kendra. She had been hacked almost in two. She started to bend down to check her, but realized there was no point.

  Kneeling beside Szakhandu, Tokkenoht saw that she was breathing. Taking her by the shoulders, she lowered her to the ground and examined the spear wound. The spear had pierced the thicker skin near her back, gone through her abdomen, and poked out several inches from her belly. Tokkenoht had little knowledge of lizzie anatomy, but she hoped that she had enough magic to heal whatever had been damaged inside Szakhandu’s body.

  “Can you hear me, child of the same egg?” she called, but the other female gave no sign of consciousness.

  Standing up, Tokkenoht placed her foot on Szakhandu’s side and, as carefully as possible, pulled the spear out the way that it had gone in. The wound near her back bled freely, and the other probably did too, though it was difficult to see beneath her. Placing one hand over the exposed wound, the priestess slid the other beneath, until she felt the slick puddle forming on the floor.

  “Uutanuhn, uutanuhn, uutanhn.”

  Another female was suddenly beside them. It was one of the palace servants; Tokkenoht didn’t remember her nam
e. She had bandages and healing salves with her.

  “Bandage her and then have her taken to the hearth room,” said the priestess, as she stood up and then hurried back over to the king.

  “Take me to my hearth!” Hsrandtuss was growling.

  “Not yet,” said Tokkenoht. “You are not ready to be moved.”

  “I want to die on my own sleeping mat, Yessonar curse the world!”

  “You are not going to die, Great King. I forbid it. But I do need to take this spear out, and it is going to hurt.”

  “Quit talking about it and just do it.”

  Rather than doing it herself, Tokkenoht signaled to the males standing around. Two of them held the king down while another held onto his leg, and a fourth pulled what was left of the spear out. Hsrandtuss gurgled in pain. Healing salves were squished into the wound and it was bandaged. Others had already bandaged most of his other wounds. Someone had washed the blood off his face.

  “Take the Great King to his hearth,” said Tokkenoht.

  “Not now, foolish female!” growled the king.

  “Foolish female?”

  Hsrandtuss started and then looked up at her face. “I am sorry, my wife. That was poorly spoken. But if I’m not going to die, I have things to do. Where is Attarkakhis?”

  “Here, Great King.”

  “Is the palace secure?”

  “I believe so, but I have warriors sweeping the building and the grounds.”

  “Good,” said Hsrandtuss. “Why are you even here? I thought you were taking a patrol south.”

  “I had just started when Straatin sent word of the attack on the palace. I came as soon as I could.”

  “Just in time. Where is Straatin?”

  “Dead,” said Attarkakhis. “He was cut down just outside of the throne room.”

  “Where is Slechtiss? He was supposed to be here.”

  “We haven’t found him or his wife.”

  “What of Tulu?” asked Tokkenoht.

  “My wife is safe,” replied Attarkakhis.

  “May we move you to the hearth now, Great King?” Tokkenoht’s tone was perhaps not as respectful as it might have been, but Hsrandtuss didn’t comment on it.