Magemother: The Complete Series (A Fantasy Adventure Book Series for Kids of All Ages)

by Austin J. Bailey

  “Maybe a current will catch us eventually,” Fitz mumbled, stretching out to rest.

  Wind caught Tabitha’s hair and tossed it, making her look around. Thick clouds had gathered in the crimson sky, dark and menacing, shaped like anvils and towers and saddles and other things that clouds should not be shaped like when you are on a tiny raft in the ocean.

  “Oh no,” she breathed. The wind picked up and the smooth water beneath them started to swell. Soon they were riding waves up and down. It felt like they were on a sled, racing over hills of black snow. Every moment a new hill would rise in front of them and they would climb it, then Tabitha would grab hold of the raft and try not to scream as they slid down the other side.

  “This is going to get worse,” Fitz warned. As if responding to his words, lightning lanced across the red sky and the corner of their raft dipped into the ocean. Tabitha watched, horrified, unable to move as black water slid over the surface of the raft like quicksilver, brushing her hand.

  When it touched her, she felt more afraid than she ever had before, though she couldn’t think why. It was just water, after all. Wasn’t it?

  “Look!” Fitz shouted, pulling her from her fearful thoughts. “The storm is pushing us towards it!”

  Tabitha glanced up to see the island, much larger now, hovering before them in the water. “Will we get there in time?” she called as the wind began to howl. His answer was drowned out by a wave of thunder. A few drops of water followed it, black and cold as the ocean beneath them. Then few became many, and in a moment, they were soaked through.

  Tabitha couldn’t see the island anymore. She couldn’t see the ocean beneath them, but she knew it was there. She had lost track of which way was up, but she could still breathe, so she knew she must not be underwater. The wind was screaming now, and she couldn’t hear Fitz. Her stomach lurched as they tipped over the top of a wave. She screamed without hearing it, her head smacking into the wood of the raft as they skidded down the water on the other side. She kicked out wildly, looking for Fitz with her feet, and connected with something soft. His stomach, she thought, or his face maybe. Good, at least she wasn’t totally alone.

  She was wet to the bone, frozen stiff. Her fingers were screaming at her through the cold, begging her to let go and fall into the waves. She considered it briefly, and then the choice was taken from her as the raft corkscrewed off the end of a violent wave and sent her careening into the cold, frothing dark.

  She felt fear then, worse than before. She had felt fear in her heart before, at the thought of being alone forever. She had felt fear in her stomach too, when she tripped down the stairs in the dark and thought she had broken her leg. Now she felt fear with her whole body—everywhere the water touched, springing out of her skin, her hair, her throat. She swallowed it, choking on death itself.

  Then her hands briefly touched something firm. The water pulled her away from it, and she clawed at it fruitlessly. A second later a wave sent her back and her hands touched it again, her face, her body. She had reached the island. Somehow she got her feet beneath her and ran until the waves and the wind and the rain was gone.

  She collapsed beneath the shelter of a stone arch at the edge of a dark city. Fitz was there, waiting for her in the shadows, looking wet and cold and terrified, as if death itself had shaken his hand. After what she’d just been through, it probably had.

  “What else are you afraid of?” he whispered.

  “I don’t know.”

  He gave her a half smile. “Well, I guess we’re about to find out.”

  They rested for a while, then finally, because it was the only thing to do, Tabitha pushed herself to her feet and walked into the dark city. Fitz followed her. They passed under a low city gate and turned randomly, haphazardly down streets lined with dark houses squashed together like too many peas jammed into one pod. Presently, they rounded a corner and caught sight of a column of smoke trailing from the narrow black chimney of a bedraggled‐looking inn. They stood at the edge of a wide, empty square. The moon was high in the black sky, and the only sign of life in the city was an ancient looking hag wrapped in black rags, who had settled herself awkwardly in the middle of the square with her legs jutting out from under her at odd angles, as if they were too old to fold properly.

  “Oh!” Tabitha said. “I know where we are!” The fear had fallen from her face, replaced with a look of wonder.

  “Where?” Fitz asked, but she didn’t answer.

  They walked toward the old woman, their feet echoing softly beneath them. She had a small black bowl and was spreading birdseed on the ground around her. Most of the birds were asleep, of course, but occasionally some nocturnal creature would idle down from a nearby eave and sample her wares.

  “Wayla,” Tabitha said pleasantly, sitting down next to the old woman, “I can’t believe you’re still here.”

  “Leave me be,” the woman croaked. “I’m not makin’ any trouble. Mindin’ my own business, I am.”

  Tabitha paid her no mind. She picked up some birdseed and held it in her upraised hand, calling to the birds, waking them from their small dreams. They came to her, Jay and Sparrow and Dove, and emptied her hand. The woman turned a wondering eye on her, whispering, “Not a waste, then, I see.” Then she vanished.

  Fitz let out a little involuntary shout and stamped his foot around on the stones where the old woman had been a second before. “Is she a witch? I don’t like witches,” he declared. “Are you afraid of witches?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think she’s a witch. I don’t know what she is. She’s just Wayla. She’s been here feeding the birds at night since I was little. I grew up here,” she explained, remembering that she hadn’t told him.

  “Here?” he said, looking around for some explanation of where here was. “Here where?”

  “Hesh,” she said. “By the sea. I haven’t been here since…” The shadow of a dark memory fell across her face. She shook it away and said, “What is Hesh doing in the nymph kingdom?”

  Fitz rubbed his eyes wearily. “It isn’t real. It’s part of the test.” He looked around at the buildings, the cobwebs shining in the moonlight, stretching between the close‐set houses. A mouse ran out of a drain in the square and picked at the birdseed. “Sure looks real, though.”

  Voices fell over them from across the square. Three people, two adults and a child, moved toward them without seeing them. A mother and a father, each holding their daughter’s hand. The child said something, pointing at a bird landing in the square, and the father laughed.

  “No,” Tabitha said softly, rising.

  “What?”

  “We can’t be here. This isn’t real.”

  “What can’t be? What’s going on, Tabitha? Who are those people?”

  Tabitha had her hands over her mouth. She was backing away, trying to turn around, trying to run, but her eyes were glued on the people walking towards them.

  A man leaped from the shadows at the people on the other side of the square. He was dressed in black, a long knife flashing in his hand. The father reached for him, slipped on something wet on the ground—wash water, a rotten tomato, he would never know—and fell beneath the knife. The woman screamed, “Tabitha!”

  Fitz turned to see Tabitha running, her back to the screaming woman and the little girl and the man with the knife. He followed her.

  “What was that?” he asked her, when she stopped. She had reached the sea and could run no further. She shook her head, unwilling to put a name to it, but he had already guessed. “Was that you?” he said. “A memory? Your family? The woman screamed your name before…before…” He hadn’t seen it, but he knew what had happened.

  Tabitha wasn’t listening. She had that faraway look in her eyes again, like she was someplace else. A tear streaked down her face and her expression changed, darkened. She wore rage like a mask—one that she had never worn before. She walked down the shore until the black water covered her feet.

  “What are yo
u doing?” Fitz cried, but it was too late. She dove into the ocean, swimming madly, not out, but down, looking for something in the darkness, something born of pain and fear and need. She knew it would be there, waiting for her; it always had been.

  Fitz watched the water, waiting, then fell backwards, shielding his eyes as something massive burst from the waves, sprinkling the shore with water. Each drop pricked his skin with ice cold fear. Fear rose out of the water too; he had no other name for it. A great menacing creature, black as the ocean, dripped darkness and fire over the shore, its great wings pounding him flat against the sand with air, its eyes the color of Tabitha’s. It soared over the city wall and banked toward the square. Fitz ran after it. He heard the dragon bellow, heard flame issuing from its mouth, heard jaws snapping and a man’s high, wild cry. Then he heard nothing.

  When he made it to the square, the man in black was gone. The father and mother lay on the ground. Tabitha was walking across the square holding the younger girl’s hand, talking to her in soft tones. She took her to Wayla, the old woman, who had reappeared amid her circle of birdseed, and the older Tabitha, hands shaking, handed her younger self over to the woman.

  “I’ll take her to the wizard’s school,” Wayla said. “They’ll find a place for her.”

  “I know.”

  Wayla turned the girl’s head away from her fallen parents and led her out of the square, then everything, the square, the city, Wayla, and the small Tabitha, disappeared. They were alone in the ocean again, on the little raft under the stars.

  “I’m sorry,” Fitz said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

  She turned to him, searching his face, his eyes. Tears filled her own. She put her face on his chest. “Why did I do that?” she asked. “Why did you let me?”

  “It’s what I would have done,” he said. “He deserved it.”

  “I’m just like him,” she sobbed. “Just like him now!” She beat his chest with her fist.

  “Tabitha!” He shook her, making the raft rock beneath them. “This is all just a dream! Just a dream!”

  She came out of his arms, blinking. “Just a dream,” she muttered. “I forgot…it seems so real. Did I fail the test?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t think it’s that simple. Anyway, it’s not over yet.” He pointed at something ahead of them and she followed his finger. The ocean disappeared before them, just stopped in a dark line, beyond which nothing was visible. A sound like thunder issued from the place the water disappeared and it took her a moment to realize what it was.

  “Hold on,” Fitz said, taking her in his arms. They were speeding towards it now, the largest waterfall she had ever seen. “We can’t die. It’s just a dream,” he assured her.

  “Just a dream,” she repeated, her voice rising as their raft tipped over the edge. They plummeted fifty, a hundred, two hundred feet, falling away from the raft, from each other. Vaguely, Tabitha remembered that she could fly. She had done it before. She could take the shape of a bird, if she wished. She could have wings. Suddenly she remembered the other thing that she could become, that she had become, wings and wrath and rage, and she dared not become any flying thing. What if she tried to shape a sparrow and the dragon broke out of her instead? She could feel it in her still, like a memory she couldn’t get rid of. She didn’t want to risk becoming that monster again, no matter what the cost, so she pushed all thought of escape out of her mind and fell.

  Part Three

  In which there is an empty throne

  After a fall that seemed like forever, Tabitha hit water and swore she heard every bone in her body break. A hand pulled her toward air and she coughed, letting it fill her. “This dream hurts,” she mumbled, and she heard Fitz laugh.

  “Cheer up,” he said. “Look where we are.”

  She did, and it made her smile. Their raft had followed the water to where it emptied into a world of wildflowers. Everything was flowers here, she knew; there was nothing more to be afraid of. Hills rolled away from them as far as they could see, each one crowned with wildflowers of a different brilliant hue—red, blue, green, gold. Birds chirped happily, dancing through the sky, chasing each other around lilies tall as trees. A bright pink sky twinkled down at them warmly, strewn with daytime starlight.

  “What is this place?” Fitz breathed.

  Tabitha smiled in spite of herself. “I don’t know.” It looked familiar. It felt like home. It made something deep inside her relax. But she knew that she had never been there before, except perhaps in forgotten dreams.

  Something walked out of the flowers before them, purple and blue and gold parting in its wake. It was the most beautiful creature she had ever seen. It had a lion’s body and an eagle’s wings and a face that she knew would always live in her heart.

  “Peridot!” she cried, and ran to embrace her.

  “Tabitha,” Peridot said, pulling her into a hug with a great lion’s paw. “You have come.”

  “Have you been waiting for me? I’m sorry. I didn’t know!” She turned to Fitz, who was staring at his feet like he shouldn’t be there. “Fitz,” she said, “this is Peridot. She was the old Magemother’s Herald. Isn’t this lovely? But, Peridot!” she said, remembering. “You died!”

  “Yes,” the winged lion said, her voice calm. She leaned in until their eyes almost touched. “Now you protect the Magemother.”

  Tabitha covered her mouth, averting her eyes, staring at the flowers. “That’s right,” she whispered. “Why did she pick me?”

  Peridot’s eyes softened. “She picked you because she sees in you what you do not. Not yet, at least,” she added.

  Tabitha reached out to touch the lion’s face, then brought her hand back and held her arms close, like a wounded thing. She whispered, “I don’t want to be the Magemother’s Herald anymore, Peridot. I can’t.”

  “I know,” Peridot said. Her eyes gleamed in the rose‐tinted light. “That is why I am here.”

  “I can’t protect her. I can’t fight. I can’t hurt things.” She thought of the man lunging at her parents with a knife, saw herself rising out the black water, terrible, carrying death between her wings like a chain. She shuddered. “I can’t be…what she needs me to be.”

  Peridot lifted her head and turned away. “Then she will die.”

  Tabitha sunk to her knees, buried her face in her hands. “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Peridot roared.

  Tabitha peeked over her hands to see the great lion leap into the air. Peridot flapped her wings once, twice, then landed beside Fitz, knocking him to the ground with a swipe of her paw. Fitz was trembling.

  “Will you let me kill him?” Peridot asked, turning to look at her calmly. “Will you let me kill your friend as you will let them kill the Magemother?”

  Tabitha leaped to her feet. “She’s my friend, too,” she said viciously. “And so is Fitz. Peridot, stop!”

  Peridot looked back at Fitz, stepping toward him as he scurried across the ground, backing away from her. “He means nothing to me,” she said flatly. She sniffed the air above him. “He is old. Too old to look so young. He has lived his life. You stop me.”

  “But why?” Tabitha pleaded. “This isn’t like you.” She glanced from side to side, putting her hands to her head. “This isn’t real,” she whispered. “It’s just a dream.”

  Peridot brushed Fitz’s scrambling legs with a claw, tearing them open. Fitz screamed. Peridot roared, her face going wild, and Fitz blanched. “YOU ARE THE MAGEMOTHER’S HERALD!” she roared at Tabitha. “PROTECT HIM!” She leaped into the air, flapping her wings once, twice, gaining height, then she twisted around, spinning toward Fitz, fangs bared, paws reaching for him.

  The dragon’s claws swatted her out of the air.

  Peridot landed like a spring on the meadow floor, leaped skyward and streaked around Tabitha, dragging razor sharp claws across her scales, tearing at the soft membrane of her wing. “YES!” she roared. “GOOD!”

  Tabitha roared too, pushing herse
lf skyward, away from lion’s claws and fangs. Peridot circled her long serpentine body as she rose, darting away from her claws with expert grace.

  Tabitha let fire pour out of her, bathing them both in red.

  Peridot cried out, her wings catching fire, feathers burning, eyes blinded. She fell through the air toward the flowers. The dragon caught her before she fell too far, lowering her gently to the ground. She sniffed the lion’s scorched fur, looking for life and, finding none, groaned. The damage was done.

  Tabitha stood alone in her own form again, staring at what she had done. Then, to her surprise, the lion’s body flickered and faded, like shadows at dawn, into nothing.

  She heard a twig snap behind her, the rustle of flowers parting, and turned to see a living, vibrant Peridot stepping out of the azure petals.

  “Peridot,” she said, dumbfounded.

  “You see,” Peridot said smiling. “You have it in you. Here.” She touched Tabitha’s heart with a claw. “The fierceness that is needed.”

  “I killed you,” Tabitha whispered.

  Peridot sighed. “Death,” she said, “is a thing that you should not fear so much. It is like a shadow—dark, mysterious, but hardly real. In the end there is only life.”

  “But you’re dead,” Tabitha said numbly.

  “Am I? How would you know?”

  Tabitha shook her head, confused. “No. I don’t know.”

  Peridot smiled, then sat down beside her. “When you fight for the Magemother,” she said, “it matters not what you must do, but why you do it. How you do it. You can fight to protect the light. You can use violence and you will not become the darkness. But only if you do it out of love, out of duty, and always out of absolute necessity. Ferocity is not a bad thing, any more than a sword is a bad thing, or a rock. It is how you use it, and why, that separates the good and bad.”