Wistril Compleat

by Frank Tuttle

  Kern lifted an eyebrow. "Really?" he said. "All hours?"

  "You betcha, sonny boy," said Genner. "And when we saw that white flag -- well, if that manure-eatin' Carthrop hadn't been on our heels, we'd a' all dropped down dead outa shock. Who'd have thought it?"

  Indeed, thought Kern, as he refilled Genner's mug. Who'd have thought it?

  But it's true, he thought, that the Lady and the Lord share many passions. Whereas Wistril's interests lay within the more esoteric realms of magic, the Lady Emmerbee, Kern learned, was one of Oom's leading naturalists, although she published under an assumed name to conceal her gender. And when the Lady easily captured and quickly tamed Wistril's errant wumpus cat -- well, Wistril's praise knew no bounds; he even went so far as to dictate a scorching letter to the Review Thaumaturgica, scolding them for their "backward and sexist" editorial policies.

  "Hoot," said Sir Knobby, pointing and grinning. Kern followed the gargoyle's claw upward, to the seldom-used chamber at the top of the North Tower. Kern knew the chamber as a place of specialized magic, a place Wistril had mentioned only a few times, and then only in a "you're hardly ready for such things" context.

  A fierce bright light flared in the chamber. Kern saw two figures silhouetted against the windows; Wistril's wide form, and the Lady Emmerbee's taller one. And then the windows went black, opaque against the bright blue sky and its unnaturally still lines of motionless treetops.

  Kern counted days. Six had passed, he realized. Six of the seventeen, and then the spell will fail. And what use love, against the Carthrop's jinni?

  Kern refilled his own mug, and looked away.

  Kern had little time to observe Wistril and the Lady over the next five days. Instead, he toiled in Wistril's East Tower workroom, fashioning strange spells at Wistril's behest.

  Kern cast spells, or wove together portions of spells cast by Wistril and bound in wands or glowing Seen bottles. Kern wondered as he cast each just what it was intended to do. While he recognized portions of the most of the spellworks, other parts made no sense.

  Unlatching these will do what? Kern squinted at runes written on a scrap of Wistril's parchment and tried to make out their purpose. Why cast a spell that might, at best, mutter and flash and cast shadows on the walls? Or one that appeared to cause unworn boots to dash about?

  And yet still Wistril's instructions came, often scrawled on papers, sometimes relayed through source-less voices that caught Kern bleary-eyed and nodding.

  The days ticked by. On the fourteenth day, grumbling and thunders sounded faint from all the Towers; on the fifteenth, they continued, growing louder and longer.

  Wistril and the Lady were seldom seen, and when they were, they appeared haggard and worn.

  As the clocks chimed the ninth hour of the morning, on the seventeenth and final day, Wistril appeared at breakfast and announced that the spell would fail at exactly eight o'clock that evening.

  Silence gripped the room. The Lady Emmerbee, seated beside Wistril, kept up her smile, but even to Kern it seemed uneasy.

  After a time, forks clanked again, and whispers and mutterings began. Kern heard someone whisper "White Chair -- what can he do, against a demon?"

  Genner shushed the speaker with a hiss and a glare, but Kern saw fear spread across the faces arrayed before him.

  Soon, Wistril put down his fork and rose.

  Genner rose hastily as well, rising and bowing and trying to doff a hat he wasn't wearing all at the same time. "Beggin' your pardon, Lordship," he said. "I'm sure nobody meant no insult. They're just scared," he said. "But it's a mighty poor way to repay your hospitality, and that's a fact, and I'm sorry them words was spoken at your table."

  Wistril bowed, and bade Genner sit with his hand. "No apology is required," he said. "They spoke but truth. I am of the White Chair mages, and I may not use offensive magics, even in the cause of right."

  Forks clanked as they were set down suddenly in plates.

  "But that hardly means we are defenseless," said Wistril. "Indeed, were we relying on the might of any man's magic against such a creature, we would surely be lost, for no spell will prevail against it, no matter the path of the caster."

  The Lady's folk looked none relieved, thought Kern -- but then, neither am I.

  "Spells may fail, and arms," continued Wistril. "But stealth and guile may win where fury and might may not."

  "You tell 'em, Lord Kauph!" said Genner, banging his mug on the table for emphasis, until the Lady Emmerbee met his eye and shook her head. "We'll guile this Carthrop right back to the Sea!"

  A ragged cheer rose up, and swelled as Genner repeated his oath. Kern even lifted his glass and joined in, causing Wistril to direct toward him a small frown.

  "Indeed," said Wistril, when the cheer died. "This very night, both Kauph and Hohnserrat shall strike a blow against Carthrop -- a blow that will once and for all see this vile Baron struck down."

  "Hear hear!" roared Genner. "You tell us what to do, and we'll make it so. I'm tired of running from that cabbage-eating tavern bully. Give me a sword, Lord Kauph, and I'll stand at your side and fight!"

  Wistril smiled. "I am honored, sir," he said. Cook discreetly appeared at Genner's side, and replaced his voluminous beer mug with a smaller one, half-full. "But our cause would best be served if you stood with your folk. Here, in this very Hall, when the clock strikes eight of the evening."

  The Lady Emmerbee rose. "We must all do as Lord Kauph asks," she said. "And when Lord Kauph says he will lay this Carthrop low, I tell you all I believe he shall do just that."

  Wistril bowed. "I shall be occupied for the remainder of the day," he said. "Let me take this time to tell our guests from House Hohnserrat that I treasure your friendship, and delight in your company."

  The last, Kern saw, was spoken to the Lady and the Lady alone.

  Sir Knobby hooted softly, and Kern shook his head at the gargoyle's out-fanning ears.

  "Until we dine again, then," said Wistril, and he raised his cup, and the Lady raised hers, and with shaking hands Lady and wizard drank, bowed, and parted.

  "Apprentice," said Wistril, not looking back as he passed through the door. "Attend."

  Kern wiped his mouth and followed after.

  Inside the East Tower workroom, with the doors shut tight behind them, Wistril sagged, sat, and sighed. He rubbed his bleary eyes against the perpetual daylight and motioned for Kern to close the window.

  Kern did so. When he turned back to Wistril, the wizard bore two long silver wands, held tight and wide apart.

  "Contained in each of these wands," said Wistril, stifling a yawn, "Is half of a spell. Touching these wands together will complete the spell, and discharge it."

  Kern walked to stand before the wizard, and Wistril handed the wands carefully, one at a time, to Kern.

  "I see," said Kern. "And what does this spell do?"

  "It will take you, and the volume of space about you, out of the march of time," said Wistril. "It is smaller than the spell I used earlier, but it is in some ways more powerful."

  Kern inspected the wands, careful to keep them apart, feeling the odd pull they had for one another as they strained against his grasp. "How long will this spell give us?" he asked.

  Wistril shrugged. "A year, perhaps," he said. "Ten months at the least. This spell differs from the current stasis spell in that approximately twice that shall elapse beyond the influence of the spell. The jinni, though, should find this one no less difficult to breach."

  Kern stood. "Ten months inside, twenty months out?" he said. "That's a long time, either way."

  Wistril nodded agreement. "Take care to be near the larder, before you bring them together," he said. "There is ten month's food there, if one is careful. Oh, and use fires sparingly," he added. "The air might go bad, if you burn them too much."

  Kern looked upon Wistril with dawning horror. "You speak as if you don't plan to be there, Master," he said. "Why is that?"

  Wistril set his jaw.
"You have your instructions, Apprentice," he said. "Stay near the Lady and her folk. Stay near the larder. I shall have tasks elsewhere."

  "Tasks such as defeating an angry jinni?" said Kern. "I've tried to figure out what you're doing, with all those spell fragments I assembled," he said. "I still have no idea what harm any or all of them will do the jinni, or its master."

  "A jinni, even bound to the will of one's mortal enemy, is well nigh invulnerable," said Wistril. "As is the master who bound it. We shall seek to land no blows upon either, Apprentice, for all such effort would surely be wasted."

  Kern frowned. "What, then?"

  "The jinni is most dangerous when it is bound," said Wistril. "Only a fool would attack it. The jinni's binding, though -- that is what I seek to destroy."

  Kern tilted his head. "How?" he said. "We'll only have an instant. Just long enough for Herthmore to say 'Get them,' correct?"

  Wistril leaned back on his stool, and for the first time Kern saw the beginnings of a smug half-smile begin to shape the wizard's lips.

  "I leave this as an exercise for you, Apprentice," he said. "Harken back, to the nature of the jinni's binding, cleverly found out by Lord Essraven. This wretch Herthmore must answer the jinni's query seven times each day, or see the jinni unbound, and be doomed. Correct?"

  Kern nodded, comprehension dawning.

  "And if someone, or something, other than the jinni were to ask Herthmore its name, he'd have no choice but to answer," said Wistril. "How is this Herthmore to know which is the jinni, and which is our haunt?" asked Wistril. "And while Herthmore replies, he cannot command. And if he slips, if he falters, is he mis-speaks even once, though he does so in reply to our own Lord Essraven -- then sad Herthmore has broken the binding, and he is undone."

  Kern paced and spoke. "The spooks. You've set them at the edge of the spell, ready to fly out the instant it falls. You've told them to find Herthmore. Told them to whisper in his ear and speak the jinni's challenge." Kern halted, spread his hands. "Am I correct?"

  Wistril nodded, once. "I commend you, Apprentice," he said. "That is the bulk of my plan."

  Kern rolled his eyes. "What I haven't surmised is what the all-powerful jinni will be doing, while this is going on," said Kern. "Do you really believe it will just hover quietly by and let Essraven and the lads whisper things in its master's ears?"

  "I do not doubt the jinni has instructions to safeguard its master from attack," said Wistril. "But the jinni is, by nature, a treacherous and cunning beast. Unless Herthmore's instructions specifically refer to haunts and whispered queries concerning the jinni's name, I believe the jinni will do nothing, save watch and bide its time."

  Kern sighed.

  "And the rest of your clever plot?" he said. "Does it involve banishing the jinni, once it is freed?"

  "It is true my plan has other elements," said Wistril. "But it is also true that I am relying on the malice of the jinni to be to our advantage. Of course it will see my intention, Apprentice. I hope it will also see a way to set itself free. I believe we can rely on the jinni's inherent treachery, in that regard."

  "And these?" said Kern, lifting the wands. "Why these, if you're so sure of victory?"

  "We shall loose the haunts," said Wistril. "Loose the haunts, and then you shall bring the wands together, and even if the jinni desires vengeance on the whole of Kauph, it shall wait two years to do it," said the wizard. "If freed, I do not believe it will wait, here in this hated realm. Nor do I believe it will stay and bother to search out every second of every minute of every day touched by the wand-spell."

  Wistril mopped his bald forehead with a handkerchief. "It is the best that I can do, Apprentice. Confound it. It shall have to suffice."

  "And the Baron?" said Kern.

  Wistril scowled. "Oh, I have not forgotten the Baron," he said. "Rest assured, Apprentice. Either way, he shall pay for his insult to the Lady, to this House, to you. Rest assured, he shall pay."

  Kern bowed. "As you say, Master," he said. "Is there anything else?"

  "No," said Wistril. "Go. Find the Lady. Stay by her side." He looked at a clock, whirling on a table, and grimaced.

  "Ten hours."

  "Ten hours, then." He turned, stopped at the door, cleared his throat. "Um, Master," he said. "For what it's worth, she's a remarkable lady. I take back everything I said, and how I said it. You've done the right thing, and we're proud, every one from Sir Knobby on down."

  Wistril turned, and vanished, and Kern opened the door.

  "Ten hours," said Kern. The wands pulled against his grasp, drawn together by the force of the halved spell.

  "Not yet," said Kern, drawing them apart. "This isn't over yet." He hurried down the Hall, hearing clocks whirl and tick all the way.

  Two hours, three hours, five hours, eight. Kern marked them off, fighting off yawns with strong black coffee and meeting the frightened eyes of those about him with smiles and swaggering banter.

  By the ninth hour, everyone was gathered in the Great Hall. Kern waited until the doors were shut, and then he counted heads; twenty-two people, counting himself, and eighty-six gargoyles, including Sir Knobby. That meant nearly three hundred of Wistril's staff was hiding in the woods beyond the castle; Kern wondered just what they were up to while he hoped they were doing it quietly.

  Wistril, though, was not in the Hall. Nor was Lady Emmerbee, Genner, or Sir Knobby. Kern assured all those who asked that his master and theirs were merely preparing for the confrontation to come, but he could tell they were less than completely reassured.

  One of Kern's first acts after speaking with Wistril was to fetch the goblin-clock from the study and bring it carefully down to the Great Hall. There, it had stepped gingerly out of his hands and onto the table, examined the age-blackened table-top with brief metallic disdain, and had settled on a corner near the door before resuming its steadfast clicking.

  Kern sought out the clock-face. Half an hour, he thought. No more.

  The clock ticked on. Finally, as Kern was about to send one of the lads to seek out Wistril and the Lady, the Great Hall doors flew open, and Lady Emmerbee stepped through. Genner, Sir Knobby, and the serving gargoyles followed in her wake. Kern noted that the butler was red-faced and grinning, that the gargoyles in the dresses immediately commenced a fierce round of soft hooting with their fellows, and that Sir Knobby himself was glassy-eyed and open-mouthed.

  The goblin-clock chimed. Kern counted, licked his lips, shouted for Sir Knobby.

  Ten minutes, he thought. Where is the Master?

  Before Sir Knobby could ease his way through the crowd, a roar like thunder filled the room, and a sudden brief tremor, and a fleeting sensation of falling. Gargoyles hooted; candles flickered; somewhere, a chair fell, and then all was silent.

  The goblin-clock squeezed its eyes shut, and clasped its bells down tight with tiny clicking hands.

  Another blast rang out in the Hall, louder and longer than the first, so loud it rattled glass throughout Kauph and nearly made Kern drop his wands.

  "Now, Apprentice!" shouted Wistril, unseen, in the wake of the blast. "Complete the spell! Do it now!"

  "No!" shrieked Lady Emmerbee, when she saw the wands in Kern's hands. "I beg you, do not!"

  Kern brought the wands near, but kept them from touching. "Join us, Master," he shouted, casting to and fro for some glimpse of Wistril. "Join us and I'll touch them."

  "Confound you, Apprentice,"" shouted Wistril, still unseen, in reply. "We have no time. The spell has failed. The haunts are doing their work. Save yourselves, while you may!"

  Kern took in a breath. "I'll save us all, Master," he said, drawing the wands apart. "Save us all, or save none."

  The Lady let out her breath. "In truth, he means as he says," she cried. "Join us, husband! Join us, and let the jinni be!"

  Wistril appeared, scowling fiercely, standing atop and in the center of the Great Hall dining table. Beside him appeared the big oval scrying mirror, its glass a worried blac
k, runes writhing and dancing across its mahogany frame. In his hand, Wistril held his staff, which glowed at the ends and trailed smoke. "Confound it, touch the wands!" he cried. "Now!"

  Kern nodded, brought his hands together quickly, let the attraction of the wands for each other speed their flight. His hands met with a flash, and the wands spat fire, coiled about each other, and vanished.

  "Done, Master," said Kern. "We're safe."

  The air in the Great Hall went chill. Kern watched as everywhere breath began to steam, as glasses and plates were covered with sudden rimes of ice, as the face of the goblin-clock went white with frost.

  Wistril saw, and went pale. "No," he said. "No, apprentice, I fear we are not safe at all." Wistril turned to face the Lady Emmerbee, his face grave. "I fear I have failed you, Lady," he said. "For this, I beg pardon."

  A new thunder rode the air, and it took an instant for Kern to recognize it not as thunder, but as chuckling.

  "Ho, wizard," said the thunderous new voice. "Where shall you now hide, if not beneath the river of time?"

  Still atop the table, Wistril turned toward the voice. "I shall not hide at all," he said. "I await you here. These others, though. They have done you no harm."

  Laughter rang out. A darkening in the air formed before Wistril, took on the shape of something tall and swaying and many-limbed. The shadows it cast were like those of thick ropes, coiling and uncoiling ceaselessly about some gnarled inner trunk.

  "Harm?" snarled the jinni. "What do you know of harm?" it said. "Have you been forced to this miserable realm and enslaved, where every touch of earth or air is as a stroke of flame?"

  "Ah, but are you are not freed?" asked Wistril, as the writhing shadows fell across him.

  "Indeed, I am freed," replied the jinni. Kern saw just a hint of a smile take shape with in the shadows, many teeth within it, and then it was gone. "It seems my former captor mis-spoke the binding. I shall miss him," said the shadow. "He was a man of rare . . . taste."