The Seventh Sigil

by Margaret Weis

  A monk seated on a stool near the door rose at the entrance of the master. He and the monk exchanged glances and the monk departed, leaving Dubois and the master alone.

  “Father Jacob Northrop,” said the master, indicating the prisoners. “Sir Ander Martel.”

  Sir Ander had been lying on his bed reading a book. Seeing Dubois, the knight closed the book, dropped it on the bed, and rose to his feet.

  One of the Knight Protectors, charged with protecting the lives of the members of the Arcanum, who were often sent on dangerous missions, Sir Ander Martel was about fifty years of age and, Dubois knew, had been traveling with Father Jacob for twenty of those years. Dubois wondered on what legal grounds Sir Ander was being held. Knight Protectors were assigned to their charges; they had no say in the matter. If Father Jacob had committed an act of heresy, could Sir Ander be held complicit? A pretty legal problem.

  Sir Ander was a well-built man, tall, with a military bearing. Not long ago, he had saved Dubois’s life when a contramagic bomb was tossed into the room in which they were meeting. He had warned Dubois and the others in the room to take cover, then picked up the bomb, and threw it out the door a mere second before it exploded. Dubois gave Sir Ander one of his little bows to show he remembered and was grateful. Sir Ander frowned.

  “Father,” he said in warning tones, “we have company.”

  In his midforties, Father Jacob was of medium height. His hair had once been brown, but was now almost completely gray. He had worn the tonsure, but that was starting to grow out. Normally clean-shaven, he had a stubbly growth of gray beard. A Freyan by birth, he had fled his homeland after the Reformation to come to Rosia. He was what people called a savant—a crafter born with magic at his fingertips, as the saying went. He was undoubtedly one of the most brilliant wielders of magic in the world … and probably the most eccentric.

  Dubois was considerably disconcerted to see Father Jacob crawling on his hands and knees on the floor of his cell with a piece of chalk. Moving nearer, he saw that Father Jacob was drawing the sigils of a construct. Dubois looked around in astonishment to see the priest had covered most of the walls and floor with constructs. The magic made no sense to Dubois. As he watched, fascinated, Father Jacob uttered an exclamation of irritation and with his sleeve rubbed out what he had just drawn.

  All this time, the master waited, not moving. This was nettlesome to Dubois. The master’s presence stood in the way of his important business here. He needed to speak to Father Jacob in private.

  He bowed to the monk. “Thank you, Master. You need not stay, I need to be alone with the prisoner.”

  “That is not possible,” said the master. “A guard must be present at all times. Given the prisoner’s skill as a savant, no cell could hold him. The only way we can ensure Father Jacob will not break out is to keep him under constant surveillance. I will be present.”

  Dubois was annoyed with himself. He should have foreseen this. Most prisons used magical energy drains in cells where they kept crafters. The magic was built into the walls and drained the energy of any construct the prisoner might use to try to break out.

  A drain would not work with a savant such as Father Jacob, who did not need to inscribe a physical construct. He used his mental powers to fuel his magic, which made it all the more puzzling to Dubois to see Father Jacob on the floor drawing magical constructs that were seemingly harmless.

  “We offered Father Jacob and Sir Ander the opportunity to swear by their faith in God that they would not try to escape,” the master continued. “Both men refused, stating that they have not been given a chance to defend themselves at a public trial and that they thus believe their imprisonment to be unjust.”

  No, there could not be a public trial, Dubois thought with an inward sigh.

  He eyed the master, wondering what was going on in the mind behind that inscrutable face. Where did his loyalties lie? The monks of Saint Klee claimed to be loyal to God and God alone. Dubois hoped that was true. He decided upon a compromise.

  “Perhaps you could wait in the outer room during my interrogation, Master. You would be able to react swiftly if the prisoners tried to escape. I can easily call for your help.”

  The master regarded Dubois in silence. Dubois endured the scrutiny, thankful he had a clear conscience. He would not otherwise have wanted to sustain that soul-piercing stare. Apparently satisfied, the master walked into the outer chamber, although he left the door open. Dubois would have liked to have closed it, but having won a small victory, he did not want to continue the fight.

  Dubois took the small stool usually occupied by the guard and dragged it in front of Father Jacob’s cell. Dubois perched on the stool, placing the small writing desk on his knees. He cast a glance outside the door, then opened the lid to the desk and took out pen, ink, and paper.

  “This man is Dubois, the bishop’s creature, sent to interrogate you, Father,” Sir Ander said bitingly.

  Father Jacob looked up from this work. Sitting back on his heels, he wiped his hands on his cassock, the black of which was now gray from chalk dust. He smiled broadly.

  “Monsieur Dubois. Good to see you again. I am glad you have brought implements for writing. I would like very much to tell you all I know and to have my words set down on paper.”

  “May I ask what you are doing, Father?” Dubois asked, studying the constructs.

  “He’s doing his best to ensure that we are burned at the stake,” said Sir Ander bitterly. “Don’t say a word, Father.”

  “My dear Ander, I’ve committed so many crimes, broken so many laws that a few more won’t matter. I am studying contramagic,” said Father Jacob.

  Dubois felt the hair on the back of his neck raise. He glanced uneasily out the door. The master was kneeling at the shrine of Saint Klee, perhaps praying for the souls of them all.

  Father Jacob noted his glance and gave a slight shrug. “The grand bishop will never set me free. I might as well work on contramagic. Someone has to study it, although I fear the knowledge we obtain will be too little, too late.”

  Dubois could almost feel the flames of an inquisitor’s fire roasting his feet. He had already seen enough to be branded as a heretic, however, so he might as well proceed. He placed the paper on the desk and set the jar of ink in the small holder built into the top of the desk. He smoothed the paper, but did not pick up the pen.

  “What have you discovered, Father?” Dubois asked.

  “That the Church’s doctrine against contramagic is all wrong,” said Father Jacob with asperity. “Contramagic isn’t evil any more than night is evil. Night is the opposite of day. Contramagic is the opposite of magic.”

  He got down again on all fours and pointed to a magical construct that he had drawn near the bars of the cell.

  “Observe this.” Father Jacob indicated the sigils of the construct. “Contramagic uses the same six basic sigils we study as children: earth, air, water, fire, life, death.”

  “But they are backward,” said Dubois.

  “You are a keen observer,” said Father Jacob, gratified. “In contramagic, the sigils are the mirror image of their counterparts, with some subtle differences. The sigils are combined to form constructs differently, in ways I find quite ingenious. But, you are correct. They are, in essence, the same basic six only backward.”

  “So what makes contramagic work?” Dubois asked. He still had not picked up his pen.

  “I will show you,” said Father Jacob. He tapped his finger on the floor. “Do you recognize this construct, monsieur?”

  “It was on the bomb that nearly blew us up,” said Dubois.

  “Do you recognize the sigils that make up the constructs?”

  “I do. All except that one,” said Dubois, pointing.

  “Excellent, monsieur!” Father Jacob said with pleasure, as though praising a gifted student. “That is the ‘seventh sigil.’ Contramagic adds a seventh sigil to the basic six.”

  Father Jacob shook his head sadly. “Des
pite the fact that I can re-create it, I still cannot make it work.”

  Dubois was intrigued. He looked at the constructs that were scrawled all over the floor and the walls. They reminded him of the mathematical problems he had studied as a child. He could now see the mysterious seventh sigil in all of them, placed at random, sometimes at the beginning, sometimes in the middle, sometimes at the end.

  “None of these constructs do anything,” said Father Jacob, frustrated. “This seventh sigil is a mystery. Until I figure out what it represents and how it fits in with the other six, I cannot recreate the contramagic.”

  “Just as well,” Sir Ander said drily. “You’d probably blow us up.”

  “The saints knew,” Father Jacob continued, ignoring his friend. “The books I obtained from the dragons talk of the roed and the raeg. Saint Marie and the others learned about contramagic from the dragons. They wrote it all down.”

  He cast a stern glance in the direction of the master. “The monks confiscated the books before I could study them. I need access to those books!”

  He turned back to Dubois. “The grand bishop trusts you, monsieur. Speak to Montagne! Convince him of the urgency!”

  Dubois shook his head. “I am sorry, Father. What you ask is impossible. The books would now be in the Library of the Forbidden.”

  Father Jacob was very grim. He muttered the word “Fools” under his breath, gazed down at the constructs with a shrug and a sigh. He rose to his feet.

  “But you did not come here to talk about contramagic, Monsieur Dubois,” said Father Jacob. “You came to interrogate me. I am happy to talk.”

  He walked over to stand near Dubois. Sir Ander shook his head and started to go back to his bed and his reading.

  “Sir Ander, if you please,” said Dubois. “I ask you to hear what I have to say.”

  Sir Ander looked at him, frowning. Dubois shifted the stool to be able to speak to both men in a hushed voice.

  “Gentlemen, we are facing disaster,” said Dubois. “The future of the monarchy literally dangles by a thread. You are acquainted with a woman called Eiddwen, known to you as the Sorceress?”

  Father Jacob’s face darkened. “I am, monsieur, to my sorrow. What has she done now?”

  “She has sabotaged the Sunset Palace.”

  Father Jacob’s face grew darker still. “Tell me all, monsieur.”

  Dubois described how Eiddwen had assumed a false identity and taken up residence in the royal palace, bringing with her a young man she termed her nephew. Dubois had now identified him as her protégé in blood magic, a murderer known as the Warlock. He went on to tell how Eiddwen had placed contramagic “bombs” on the lift tanks and how the engineers were working frantically to keep the palace from crashing into the lake.

  “What about the king and the people who reside there? Do they know the danger?” Sir Ander asked, shocked.

  “Most of the members of the nobility left for the summer,” said Dubois. “The king knows the danger and he remains, much to his credit.”

  “What about Eiddwen?” Father Jacob demanded. “Has she been apprehended?”

  “There is worse news, if that is possible, Father. Before she fled, Eiddwen abducted the princess, Sophia.”

  He related how the Warlock had ingratiated himself with the princess and persuaded her to elope, claiming they were going to the dragon duchies, how Eiddwen accompanied them as “chaperone,” and that the Countess Cecile de Marjolaine had discovered the elopement and gone after them to rescue the princess.

  “Tell me she did go alone!” Sir Ander said, alarmed.

  “She did not, sir,” said Dubois. “A friend of yours is traveling with her. A Knight Protector named Sir Conal O’Hairt.”

  “Thank God!” said Sir Ander fervently.

  Dubois continued: “The countess discovered news of them and wrote to her aide, Monsieur D’argent. The letter was in code, of course. First, she said that Eiddwen has gone to Freya. She asked him to warn a … um … mutual acquaintance.”

  Father Jacob was grave. “Did you?”

  “I did, Father. I thought it was important that he should know.”

  Father Jacob nodded. “God help my countrymen.”

  “What else did the letter say?” Sir Ander asked.

  “The next part of the letter was more difficult for D’argent to understand. He believes the countess was trying to tell him that the princess is being taken to a monastery dedicated to Saint Dominick the Keeper. It is located in the Oscadia Mountains.”

  “I have never heard of such a monastery or that saint,” said Father Jacob.

  “Have you, Sir Ander?” Dubois asked.

  Sir Ander shook his head. “Dominick the Keeper. Keeper of what?”

  “Keeper of the Gates of Hell,” said Dubois.

  He related the story. “The monks were sent to drive the fiends back and seal the gate,” he said in conclusion.

  “What was the date this monastery was built?” Father Jacob asked abruptly.

  Dubois was startled. “Around the year 25 DT, when the Dark Ages were nearing an end. Why?”

  Father Jacob clasped his hands behind his back and began to pace the small cell, talking to himself. Dubois strained to listen.

  “So we have a monastery dedicated to Saint Dominick the Keeper of the Gates of Hell founded in the mountains of Oscadia. A strange place to build a monastery. A strange choice for a saint. A strange time to build it, when the Church had few resources and was struggling to survive. A strange tale of fiends attacking a village.”

  He walked back and forth the short distance between the iron bars and the wall. Dubois looked at Sir Ander, who could only shrug.

  “It makes no sense to me,” he said.

  Father Jacob stopped pacing. He stared into the distance, past the iron bars, past the prison walls, perhaps down through centuries. Suddenly he whipped around, his cassock shedding chalk dust. He came close to the bars of the cell, clasped them with his hands so hard that his knuckles were white.

  “God help us, Monsieur Dubois! If what I fear is true, the Church has committed an unspeakable crime.”

  Dubois picked up the writing desk and drew his stool near Father Jacob. Sir Ander had moved as close as the bars of his cell would allow.

  “What do you suspect, Father?” he asked.

  Father Jacob shook his head. His lips were pressed tightly together, his brows were lowered and his expression was grim.

  “Let us postulate that by some means survivors from the sunken isle of Glasearrach made their way to the surface. They did not travel by ship, but on foot.”

  “That would mean they would have to climb up from the bottom of the world! How would that be possible?” Dubois was skeptical.

  Father Jacob shrugged. “We know that rivers such as the Safelle flow into sinkholes and from there become subterranean rivers, running beneath the ground, carving through the rock, forming vast caverns. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that an intrepid explorer could travel up from Below through such caverns, reaching the surface by following the course of the river.”

  “God makes all things possible,” said Dubois, still not entirely convinced.

  He began to jot down the information, using a code he had developed himself.

  “Let us assume this is what occurred,” Father Jacob continued. “Survivors from the doomed island reach the surface. They are ecstatic. They can save their people from a life of darkness and hardship by bringing them back to the world. They find the nearest village and tell their story. Sadly, their story was a tale that must never be told.”

  Dubois’s hand started to shake. He dropped a blot of ink on the paper. He glanced at the door, wishing himself on the other side of it. Wishing himself on the other side of the world. Too late. He knew too much already.

  Sir Ander was shaking his head in disbelief. “Think about what you are saying, Father! You are accusing the Church of having knowledge that people were alive on the island at the bottom
of the world and that the Church did nothing to help them.”

  “I am accusing the Church of worse than that,” said Father Jacob grimly. “Consider this: The Church used contramagic, which they had proclaimed to be a tool of the Evil One, to sink the island. They expected everyone on that island to die. Their secret would never be revealed. But now they are confronted with survivors who will tell the tale.

  “How could the Church explain that they had essentially conspired with the Evil One to kill countless innocents? They could not do so. The Church made up a story about fiends escaping from the mountain. They sealed up the entrance and built a monastery on the site, commanding the monks to guard the Gates of Hell.”

  “I don’t believe it,” said Sir Ander harshly.

  “I do,” Dubois said in an unhappy whisper. He crumpled up the paper on which he had been writing. “I have long known the grand bishop has been guarding some dark and terrible secret, a secret that is destroying his health, eating him up inside.”

  “Montagne has allowed countless people to die rather than risk revelation,” said Father Jacob sternly, not bothering to lower his voice. He added with a sigh, “I wonder if he knows the monks of Saint Dominick have failed in their duties.”

  “What do you mean?” Sir Ander asked.

  “The Bottom Dwellers found their way up once,” said Father Jacob ominously. “They could find it again.”

  “You are saying they came back to the monastery!” said Sir Ander, aghast.

  “That is the only reason I can see that they would be taking the princess to the monastery, though I cannot fathom why they want her. Perhaps to hold her hostage.”

  “But if that is true, Cecile and Sir Conal could be walking into an enemy camp! And I have no way to warn them!” Sir Ander exclaimed in agony.

  “They are in God’s hands, my friends, as is the princess,” said Father Jacob. “Have faith. He will keep them safe.”

  “Why do you think Eiddwen is going to Freya?” Dubois asked.

  “To bring death, mayhem, chaos, and destruction,” said Father Jacob in dire tones.