Touched by the moment, the gloved conductor passed onto the platform my large leather suitcase with small iron wheels. I gave him a crown.
“Oh, Thomas!” mother clasped her hands. “You look beautiful!”
“How are you,” I shyly welcomed them, hiding a smug smile.
Joe scratched his head, trying to decide where to put my luxurious case.
“Throw it in the back,” I solved his problem. “I’ll clean it by spell later.”
The main thing was to preserve my polished look for the occasion, while invited funeral guests were still coherent enough to notice anything—that would be until afternoon. The success of Uncle Gordon’s apprentice would honor his deceased mentor!
In his last journey Gordon Ferro was escorted by all of Krauhard. I managed to arrive at the time of the bearing out, walked to the cemetery in the morning chill, waited until the priest had performed all the rituals for the final rest, and threw a pinch of salt on the coffin. I looked like a walking advertisement of the benefits of education, and even threw off a speech to thank my first teacher Gordon. Those present nodded understandingly and embarked on a return trip to the tables, set in the machine yard in the open air. First songs and the rousing rhythm of a tambourine sounded; the most beautiful Krauhardian girl—the daughter of the village’s headman—raised a pennant symbolizing the funeral of a dark magician. The street festivity was also part of the tradition: whatever deity was in charge of the now deceased, it ought to take into account how many relatives the dead had done favors for.
Uncle Gordon’s funeral feast passed with enthusiasm: toasts and wishes of luck to the old man in hell or heaven were heard everywhere. Some recalled with especially acrimonious toasts that he left important stuff of theirs unrepaired (I took note of them; it would be a good dead on my part to fulfill the promises of the passed away). In general, people were optimistic regarding the destination of uncle’s soul and the prospects of their village (after all, someone was going to replace the deceased alchemist). They offered me to take his vacant place, but I pleaded that I was still studying. The tradition was observed at its best.
My neighbor across the table fascinatingly depicted the mischief and tricks that Uncle Gordon got into when he was young. I experienced difficulty meshing those adventures with the image of the bilious and pedantic alchemist.
“By the way, why was the coffin closed?” I wondered.
A neighbor hissed: “He passed away suddenly, on the street. Animals ate his body a little.”
It was strange. Around Uncle’s home there were always ward-off spells that turned small animals away—the alchemist did not like his furry neighbors.
“Where did he die?”
“He was found behind his garage.”
It was sounding stranger and stranger. What would he have been doing there?
The gathering was over before the darkness fell; the villagers used to spend their nights at home in Krauhard. That is another local exotic feature: all drink, but virtually without getting drunk. Or next day there would be a new funeral. Generally, thoughts about eternal rest are very sobering. Wives were slowly taking home their swaying husbands; my neighbor across the table was given a ride in a wheelbarrow. I managed to stay up until the end without falling under the bench and soiling myself with salad from head to toe; aside from me, the only two sober were Joe and the village elder, a very proper man for Krauhard. Of course, others started asking us for help. Catching that moment, I pretended that I was going to pee and quietly hid behind the outbuildings. I didn’t want to be covered with puke! Another half an hour to make sure that I escaped the dubious honor, I decided to spend on something useful. I took a walk to the place of Uncle’s sudden death to check the condition of his ward-off spells.
My head was pleasantly spinning. The houses on the other side of the valley were bathed in sunlight, but the northern slope was cold and quite dark. There were no bushes around; otherwise, I would have gotten lost in them. To find out where exactly Uncle died was impossible—all the rocks looked the same, and, indeed, I did not feel any spells. Why was that so? Perhaps, the disappearance of the spells was the reason the old man had climbed there; usually, he did not show any passion for mounting.
I decided to walk up the hill a bit further and look for seals, the round granite washers that usually serve as anchors for household magic. Guess why they are granite, but not lead, glass, or gold? I didn’t know until Mr. Rakshat explained: that way they won’t be stolen. Though the best materials to absorb a curse are silver and copper. The rough rock washers showed up almost immediately; each of them carried a ward-off rune meaning, in theory, that no any filthy animal, real or supernatural, could come close to the dwelling of the alchemist and desecrate his corpse. I had found the only explanation—the contour wasn’t closed. The seals were set quite frequently, so that the theft of one or two washers would not affect the performance of the runes. I felt an urge to check the entire perimeter, but common sense suggested choosing another day for the investigation.
For example, a day when there would be more time before sunset, because overly self-confident dark magicians do not last long in Krauhard. And I needed to be sober, too…
I sighed, pondering how fast city life had weaned me from cautiousness, and started slowly making way back. A warm bed was already dancing before my eyes; if I sang Joe a story about poor me, tired from the trip to Krauhard, he would surely agree to give me a ride home in his carriage. A wheelbarrow would suit me fine as well… Having almost reached Uncle’s home, I came across two strange guys, poking around some junk machinery under the awning. But the excess of food eaten and drink imbibed did not permit me to understand what they were doing and why their faces looked unfamiliar. A lot of people had gathered for the funeral—maybe these guys were the guests of some villagers? Muttering, “Excuse me, dudes,” I passed them, but as soon as the strangers got behind me, something stung my side. What the hell…? My legs gave way, weak-willed corpse collapsed—not on the ground, but into the clutching hands of that duo. I was quickly pulled behind the garage.
“Well?” one of them asked tensely.
“Nothing,” the other said, thoroughly searching my pockets.
“Damn! What was he looking for here?”
“F*ck knows. What should we do? Two corpses in the same place would be suspicious; we don’t want cops’ attention.”
The first one thought for a moment. “Drop him into a gully,” he made a decision. “They’ll think he was drunk.”
All my sensibilities howled in protest: the mountain’s slope was cleaved through by the gully right behind Uncle’s property, which was kind of a canyon in miniature, all in narrow cracks and wet boulders. If I fell into it, my bones would be broken, and people would find me by smell a few days later. Alas, despite the roaring power of my Source, my muscles were limp and motionless, and I wasn’t able to concentrate on spellcasting. Another mess I got myself into!
Max came to my aid: it raised voice. The growling of the zombie-dog was as music to me. I do not know what those two had managed to descry, but in a moment only a quickly subsiding sound of footsteps reminded of their existence. I lay there, slowly grasping the horror of my situation. I couldn’t send Max for help; anyone in Krauhard would immediately recognize the zombie in it. What the drunken bums were capable of doing with the dog, I was afraid to think of. My only option was to wait for the poison’s action to end. I hoped I would be all right. Dark magicians are surprisingly overconfident! I mentally ordered Max to watch for the two strangers and prepared to wait.
Minutes dragged on slowly. It was getting dark, or maybe darkness was just growing in my eyes. I was running out of breath; all the power of my Source was not enough to drive away the nasty, pulling cold that was getting closer and closer to my heart. And then I realized that Uncle Gordon died exactly like that—alone on the cold rocks, knowing that his murder would be declared death from senile weakness. The two strangers were the cause of his death.
To kill them! But while I lay here, they would be far away, and Max seemed not to hear me.
The cold escalated into a dull ache, and fear of suffocation started pestering me. How soon would they notice that I was missing? Joe, perhaps, decided that I had gone home on foot. It would take a while until they figured out that I wasn’t there… Logic dictated that they would begin worrying only in the morning; a dark magician was more likely to survive at night than drunken rescuers.
I tried not to panic and think optimistically. To recall my job, focus on my plans for the future (I had so many of them!), focus on my eccentric family that couldn’t manage without the help of the pragmatic dark mage. The rustle of blood in my ears lulled so sweetly… but I needed to stay awake. Stop! Since when did blood rustle?!
I made an incredible effort to turn my eyes, dried out from not blinking, and noticed that something flickered on the edge of the cleft, vaguely resembling a pile of foliage whipped by the wind.
It couldn’t be worse.
Meeting a creature from the other world was the last thing that I needed now, precisely at this moment. Indeed, Rustle did not forget the heart it had heard. It came after me, but I was so young yet! On the other hand, to recall my life before dying wouldn’t take much time; I didn’t live long. First of all, I shouldn’t show the creature my fear. If my illegal practice had taught me anything, it was the conventional wisdom that the undead learned about its adversary’s power by how fearless the adversary was. Maybe it came after me to avenge its deceased comrades? What nonsense got into my head… I was not going to surrender without a fight, but my power, suppressed by the poison, would be enough for just a friendly slap. The monster would guzzle me, no question, and maybe choke as well. I would torture it with heartburn!
I needed to think about something cheerful. What was nice in my life? My motorcycle, short-term anonymous glory, my cute zombie-dog, Lyuchik who wanted to tell me something—all day long he had been bobbing around me. The two scoundrels searched for something, but what? Family honor required me to find and seize the treasure. By now every heartbeat in my chest caused sharp pain, my dried up eyes burned, and a string of pictures from the past day (so bright!) floated in my mind, mixing with episodes of the busy last year, events of the previous summer, recollections of the first meeting with Rustle.
I got scared only after realizing that I was staring at myself from outside, from the ruins, bottom-up.
Chapter 17
The auditors from the capitol did arrive, as Mr. Satal predicted, but Locomotive was not afraid of them. His office was like a storefront—transparent and shiny; it screamed, “Look, but don’t touch.” The rigorous auditors would see papers in ideal order, friendly clerks, guards in polished uniforms, and an almost complete absence of rank at the office: everyone was on an assigned task. NZAMIPS was snowed under with work!
Never before had so many operatives obtained vacations in early summer…
Locomotive did not deceive himself: had the auditors set a goal to get to him, they could have easily found or invented a case. Perhaps, that occasion wouldn’t be serious enough for a full internal investigation; in the worst case, it would lead to a reprimand or a record of “incomplete conformity”. Unpleasant, too, but he was used to that. No one could hang blame on him for the appearance of the banned potion on the market.
Judging by the displeasure with which the auditors examined the results of the police investigation, they were well aware of the situation. Yes, the case of dragon tears had already gone to court. Ms. Kevinahari had given the captain a tip, and the lab was quickly caught red-handed; however, the mastermind of that crime had fled and, by Locomotive’s estimation, was already quietly killed somewhere. Such failures could not be pardoned. In the hands of NZAMIPS investigators there were two haywire white mages and a few small fries who distributed the poison under the guise of a stimulant. Without regret, Captain Baer addressed capitol authorities on the question of how the criminals had gotten the recipe for the most dangerous venom—it was outside his jurisdiction. The villain, declared wanted, had moved to Redstone from the East Coast just a year ago, so let the central office find out what he was doing here.
For the auditing period, Mr. Satal, the senior coordinator of the region, defiantly left the city; upon returning, he was astonishingly well-informed about everything that had happened.
“We got off easy,” Mr. Satal briefly summarized the result. “Captain, I was told that they had a direct order to fire the higher-ups in Redstone’s division but could not find anybody wishing to take your post. So do not consider it a success. The Dark Knight still hangs over our heads, and no empath can predict what he is capable of.”
“It is unlikely that he will do anything crazy,” the captain said thoughtfully. “He has a new source of income now. Why would he run the risk?”
The dark mage glanced at the captain indignantly, and Locomotive regretted that he hadn’t put a protective suit on.
“Confess, you sleazebag, who is it?”
“Uh… a student, I think. I warn you, I have no evidence!”
“To hell with the evidence! Are you sure it’s him?”
The captain shrugged: “He has a non-standard channel of power. He was involved in illegal practices. For three years he lived in a dormitory, paying fifty dollars per semester; now he rents an apartment. He wears suits that cost my monthly salary, each! He is originally from Krauhard. Earlier this year he bought a black motorcycle in the ‘Plaza’.”
Locomotive did not mention the incident with the crystal, nor the fact that he had begun making inquiries only after he had seen a gentleman that the poor scruffy boy, ready to chase brownies for twenty crowns, had turned to.
“Hmm,” Mr. Satal blissfully squinted his eyes. “Introduce him to me!”
“Why?” Locomotive became tense.
“I want to look him in the eyes,” the senior coordinator fidgeted in his chair. “Don’t you understand? He’s a genius! A gold nugget. Forty-four episodes, with no insurance and not a single misfire. Ordinary mages are not capable of such things. Just Tangor the Second, you know!
“Tangor?” the captain stiffened.
“Yes! Tangor was a coordinator about twenty years ago; at the courses he drove our brains up the wall… He served here, too.”
That was why the student’s name seemed so familiar to him! Locomotive strained his memory: “Toder Tangor?”
“Exactly. How do you know?”
“We worked together. I was already a lieutenant then.”
Captain Baer belatedly realized that he was almost twice as old as his boss, and questions of seniority for the dark were a sore topic. But the danger had passed.
Mr. Satal pointedly raised his finger: “He was also a genius!”
“Sorry that he ended badly.”
“All because of his own people,” the coordinator’s face suddenly hardened. “But that will not happen to me!”
The captain politely stayed silent. Everyone has his own hang-ups! However, didn’t Baer himself rave about conspiracy of the elite? They were from the same office, and long service in NZAMIPS used to affect brains of its employees.
“By the way, the student’s name is Tangor. Do you think he is a relative?”
“All the Tangors are relatives, but it’s unlikely that our student is a close one. That coordinator lived in Finkaun.”
Locomotive breathed… and gasped: he did not have enough courage to tell the coordinator of the rewritten crystal.
“What?” Mr. Satal squinted suspiciously.
And people say that the dark mages cannot feel people!
“Aren’t you surprised with all this?” Locomotive blurted the first thing that came into his mind. “I mean the repulsive behavior of the “cleaners”, the ghouls, and dragon tears—all that in one place after ten years of quietness? Keep in mind, I had repeatedly reported about the doings of Grokk, but nobody reacted. As if nothing out of the ordinary was going on. F*ck with him, deceased! Nowa
days our prison is overcrowded with dissidents. And what is interesting is that half of them are immigrants. They lived normally somewhere, and then about a year ago decided to move to Redstone. What was the reason? Some kind of festival? Maybe I missed the poster?”
The senior coordinator frowned thoughtfully and folded his palms as if making a house of cards.
“There is an opinion swirling around,” he began cautiously, “that some of the events bear traces of premeditation.”
Who would doubt that!
“Aliens?”
“No, our own people.”
“What do they hope to accomplish?” the captain got interested.
Mr. Satal shrugged: “Power. Wealth. Satisfaction of their brutish instincts. What else can they get by fishing in troubled waters? I don’t know whether you follow politics,” Locomotive chuckled knowingly, “but suggestions to ‘improve’ the social order of Ingernika come regularly.”
“Can’t we just bring these wiseacres to reason?”
“Unfortunately, the people who generate the ideas and the ones who implement them are not the same; so far we can’t prove a connection between them. And an attempt to ban debate would have violated the principles of democracy. Our options are education and prevention of violence and destruction.”
“Don’t you think that letting them stay on the loose is kind of… dumb?”
“Risk is inevitable, but our society must prove its historical sustainability continuously, whether it wants to or not.”
The dark spoke about the problem as if he were reading a piece of paper, quietly and impartially, perhaps exactly as he perceived it. Locomotive was an ordinary man, and he couldn’t detach himself the same way. He thought about casual witnesses, innocent victims, children whose lives would be crippled by their fanatical parents. How many of the forty thousand inhabitants of fallen Nintark really wanted to participate in the large-scale magic experiment?
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