Forged In Death, Book 1 of The Death Wizard Chronicles

by Jim Melvin

  She didn’t see—or sense—what rose behind her until it was too late.

  Silk threads from the spider’s spinnerets wove around her, pinning her forearms against her torso and encasing her entire body from her shoulders down. As if by magic, the threads tore the sword from her grasp and wrapped it in a separate cocoon. Then she was yanked into space.

  “No . . . no!” she wailed. “Please save me . . . my lovvvvvvvvvvve!”

  But there was no response as the spider took her—from one hell to another.

  Escape from the Pit

  1

  As he had told Kusala that late-summer night on the outskirts of Barranca, Torg had died a thousand times. Each Death Visit, which lasted fewer than thirty long breaths, enriched Torg with magical powers. In that short time Torg fed on supernatural energy, and when he returned to life, he felt paradoxically more alive than most could imagine.

  Torg’s first Death Visit had occurred more than nine centuries ago. Ever since that amazing breakthrough, he had planned the time and place of each “temporary suicide” in precise detail, preferring to wait about a year between visits, though a few times in his life—depending on his needs—he had done so with slightly more frequency.

  Now it was mid autumn and well below freezing in the mountain prison on the peak of Asubha. The air was bitter and useless, failing to nourish Torg’s lungs. His breaths came in raspy gasps and moans, and he shivered as if in a constant state of illness.

  Dehydrated and starving, Torg was no longer able to accurately gauge the passage of time. He spent most of it in various states of unconsciousness, but when he was awake every second felt like a week.

  Even Torg could not bear much more. The insidious magic and acidic poisons imbued in the walls of the pit had ravaged his naked flesh. The hair on his body had dissolved, and his teeth had fallen out and been consumed. He could feel his immense strength leaking out of him, like blood draining from a gaping wound.

  Torg’s lone hope, he knew, was a Death Visit. He needed to feed on death’s abundant might. But something in the pit prevented him from achieving the required level of concentration.

  If I cannot die, I will go insane. I must find a way past the barrier Invictus has erected.

  And so, he attempted to meditate, again.

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Even before the completion of the first exhalation, he lost control of his concentration, and his mind wandered aimlessly, still puzzled by the sensual lure of the full moon. His long years of mindfulness training had taught him to recognize these inevitable drifts and gently return to the breath. So he discarded the thought and continued to . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  An itch tormented the tip of his nose. Torg knew that this, too, could be used as an object of concentration. Without judgment or prejudice he watched the itch rise and fall of its own accord, studying its beginning, middle and ending. He observed how it affected the workings of his body and mind. When the prickle abated, he returned to . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Torg was making progress, but the mysterious barrier continued to thwart his concentration. The walls of the pit made strange sizzling sounds, occasionally spurting blobs of caustic liquid that burned his bare skin like dragon fire. But the pain alone did not prevent him from emptying his mind or managing his thoughts. There was something else—a madness like no other.

  Despite all this, he continued to try.

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Invictus toys with me.

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  I will go insane.

  Inhale . . .

  I must find a way.

  Exhale . . .

  I will find a way.

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Watch the breath. Eliminate movement. Watch the breath. Eliminate thought.

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  No movement. No thought. Quiet mind. Peaceful mind. Only the breath.

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  As the torment of the pit further eroded his sanity, Torg struggled one last time to enter the Realm of Death, where he could feed on its power and absorb enough strength to survive a few more days. A successful Death Visit was never easy for Torg, even in the best of circumstances, requiring a magnificently intense form of meditation, even greater than that practiced by the noble ones of Dibbu-Loka. Torg’s mind had to be emptied of all thought—not just for a few breaths, or a series of breaths, but for hundreds of breaths.

  A wise Vasi master had taught Torg the art of meditation when he was a young warrior just beginning his training. Concentration creates a state of extreme relaxation. If performed at a deep enough level, meditation can slow the rise and fall of the breath and the beating of the heart to undetectable levels. But it has nothing in common with sleepiness or daydreaming. The meditator is supremely awake. Every thought, emotion, sensation, and occurrence is monitored with ultimate awareness.

  Because of their genetics, Tugars enjoyed a remarkable asset. Their flesh was unusually dense, making it highly resistant to injury. This impregnability continued even after death. An ordinary body began to decay soon after it perished, but Tugar bodies remained relatively unchanged for more than a year, and it took centuries for them to deteriorate into skeletons. Torg was the ultimate Tugar. His physical strength was unrivaled for a creature of his size, but it paled in comparison to his supernatural puissance.

  During his lifetime Torg averaged slightly more than one Death Visit per year. The act was too dangerous for more frequent attempts. Each episode required that he achieve a state called Sammaasamaadhi, the supreme concentration of mind. During Sammaasamaadhi, Torg’s heart rate progressively slowed until his body ceased to live. At that instant his karmic energy exited his flesh and entered the Realm of Death, where it fed and grew strong. But unlike an ordinary death, Torg was able to return to his body before the process became irreversible. His dense tissues—though temporarily deprived of life-giving oxygen—remained receptive to their host.

  Now, imprisoned on the rooftop of Mount Asubha, Torg lay in the pit and continued his final attempt toward Sammaasamaadhi. If he had been stronger, he would have sat up in a comfortable position to begin his meditation. But he was too weak to twitch a finger.

  Invictus’ magical barrier continued to wreak havoc within his mind. Torg searched for its source with single-minded determination. Since his first successful Death Visit more than nine centuries before, he had never experienced such difficulty in achieving Sammaasamaadhi.

  Torg remembered words spoken to him by the Vasi master who was the first to recognize that he had the rare potential to become a Death-Knower. At the time, Torg was a juvenile approaching the middle years of his warrior training.

  “Live in the present moment,” Dēsaka said. “Nothing exists but the present. All else is illusion. To live in the present moment, you must become the master of your mind.” The teacher tapped his temple with a long finger. “Thought is the thinker. To empty the mind of thought, do not think. It is that easy and that difficult. If you empty your mind of thought, you will become its master.”

  Thought is the thinker . . . that was the key.

  For the first time since being lowered into the pit, Torg felt hope, though for a moment his mind drifted back to a distant time before even his first death when he was a forty-year-old youth who had not yet become a warrior. Ever curious, Torg had harassed his Vasi master with endless queries.

  “What force could
cause the world to fall into ruin?”

  “Ignorance,” Dēsaka said.

  “What is the greatest bliss?”

  “Awakening is the greatest bliss.”

  Dēsaka sat cross-legged in the sand at the base of a great dune. A cotton veil covered his head and face, revealing only his eyes. Torg wandered in circles around the Vasi master, waving his arms.

  “Who holds the sharpest sword?” Torg said.

  “A person who speaks out of wrath holds the sharpest sword,” Dēsaka said.

  “My sword is sharpest.”

  “Your sword is sharp, but your mind is dull. You can see beyond the dunes, but you cannot see what is in front of your eyes. Even worse, you blame your stupidity on others rather than take responsibility for it.”

  “But you call me your greatest student.”

  “I say that you could become great. That you should become great. But you are not yet great. You know your strengths, but you are blind to your weaknesses. Until you can see what is in front of your eyes, you will remain an apprentice.”

  Torg smiled. His master’s insults did not have the feel of wrath. “What is the most precious treasure?” he asked.

  “Enough! Enough!” Dēsaka said. “Now I have a question for you. Will you answer?”

  “Yes, O Exalted One.”

  “What is the greatest weapon?”

  “Wisdom,” Torg said, without pause.

  “Ah, child . . . you are full of surprises. The only thing that can stop you is yourself. Your father says you are too smart for your own good. He is correct.”

  Now, as Torg lay shivering in the darkness of the pit, he replayed this tête-à-tête several times before the answer he had long sought arose.

  “You can see beyond the dunes, but you cannot see what is in front of your eyes.”

  Torg finally understood what was in front of his eyes. Invictus had never intended to disrupt his concentration; the sorcerer was too confident to consider it a necessity. But Torg’s sensitivity to the insalubrities of Invictus’ power had felt like a barrier, effectively preventing him from emptying his mind. The magic that created the pit swirled like a filthy tornado. But Torg saw through it, and his sudden clarity gave him a chance . . . which was better than none.

  More of his master’s words, spoken in a time long past, entered his awareness:

  “Breathe in. Know that you breathe in. Breathe out. Know that you breathe out.”

  Torg felt chaos start to drain from his mind . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  The wisdom of silence was his greatest weapon. It also carried a reward: the sweetness of empty mind. Awareness bloomed like a flower in morning’s first light.

  Each breath has a beginning, middle and end. The inhale has a beginning, middle and end. The pause in between has a beginning, middle and end. The exhale has a beginning, middle and end.

  Torg had observed this millions of times, and therefore knew it to be so.

  The breath is a microcosm of all existence. Torg knew this also.

  Torg used his breath as the focus. But he did not force it out of its natural rhythm. He simply became aware of it.

  When his mind wandered he drew it back—gently, but persistently—by releasing his distraction and returning the attention to the breath.

  Inhale . . .

  Breathe in and become peaceful.

  Exhale . . .

  Breathe out and become peaceful.

  Inhale . . .

  Breathe in and concentrate the mind.

  Exhale . . .

  Breathe out and concentrate the mind.

  Inhale . . .

  Breathe in and slow the breath.

  Exhale . . .

  Breathe out and slow the breath.

  Inhale . . .

  Breathe in and slow the heartbeat.

  Exhale . . .

  Breathe out and slow the heartbeat.

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  Inhale . . .

  Exhale . . .

  With one final surge of mindful concentration, Torg willed his heart to stop beating. When Sammaasamaadhi arrived, his temporary suicide began. What he experienced next occurred to all that ever live—from the simplest bacterium to the most complex animal.

  And that is what made Torg so special.

  Only a Death-Knower can die.

  And live again.

  Only a Death-Knower can return from death.

  And remember.

  Only a Death-Knower can tell us what he has seen.

  Not all care to listen.

  Torg’s lifeless body lay at the bottom of the pit, but his mind—or what some might call his soul—exploded out of the hole like a fiery boulder heaved into the night sky by a volcano. Torg became a swirling sphere of karmic energy, and he leapt great distances across time and space, drawn by a force far greater than gravity.

  The silence of meditation was nothing compared to this silence. There was no sound at all—neither was there taste, touch nor smell. There was only sight.

  Torg tumbled toward his future. He could not see his own karma; death did not permit reflection. But he could see what surrounded him. Countless other spheres—in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors—streaked alongside him like an army of comets. Torg could sense that the spheres were looking at him and at each other in mutual fascination.

  In the far distance, beyond the planets, beyond the stars, Torg knew from vast experience that a deep-blue ball awaited their arrival. It was larger than a galaxy, and billions of karmic spheres dove into it from all conceivable directions, while just as large a number rocketed outward. The ball was a cosmic headquarters for the natural cycle of life and death, directing and redirecting karma throughout the universe.

  In this realm there was no fear or pain. No pleasure or joy. In fact, all emotions were muted. Torg felt only a dry scientific curiosity. It was cold, but he did not shiver. It was bittersweet, but he did not taste. From his experience, the abilities to hear, taste, touch and smell were reserved for life.

  Death was a temporary condition. Life is short, the Vasi saying went. But death was far shorter.

  The lure of the natural order was seductively strong. Torg’s karmic sphere yearned to enter the ball and continue on its way to its next existence. His dead body was trillions of miles away on a distant world. His only chance of return was to stop short of the immense ball and hover just beyond its surface. If he entered, there would be no turning back.

  Torg had accomplished this feat a thousand times before—but never while so diminished. A large part of him wanted to give in and let the living beings he had left behind fend for themselves. What did it matter, anyway? All of them, except for the demons, would eventually die. All of them would pass through here on their ways to their next existences.

  At that moment Torg’s thoughts strayed to Sister Tathagata, as they often did during his Death Visits. Her wisdom had brought him back from the brink before.

  “Use your time wisely, child,” the High Nun of Dibbu-Loka had said to him. “Time is precious. What do you gain if you are allotted a million lives but never learn? Do not waste this life hoping that the next will be superior. Halt your suffering now.”

  Once again, Tathagata saved him. Torg stopped just outside the surface of the ball. Countless other spheres sped past him, seemingly puzzled by his decision. But Torg’s mind was made up. He would feed on the boundless energy of death and return to his body in the faraway pit.

  Was this a wise use of his time? That was yet to be seen.

  Like a bird hovering just above the surface of a stormy sea, Torg positioned his essence at the edge of the mottled cloud. All around him, spheres plunged into the broiling blueness, but Torg ignored them. His focus was too intense for distraction.

  He inhaled with great effort. Tendrils of the dark ooze crept slowly up, probing his sphere like cautious fingers. He inhaled again. This time, a great draught of the cloud flowed in
to him.

  Torg swallowed hungrily, feasting on death’s power. The blue fire engorged his essence with immeasurable pleasure. His sphere bloated to ten times the size of the others, then one hundred. He grew as large as a planet. Fiery blasts of blue light danced around and through him. Incoming and outgoing spheres avoided his presence. If they crashed into him now, they would be obliterated.

  “Use your time wisely, child,” the mortal from the distant world had said.

  In Torg’s awareness, the words were quiet and soft, holding little meaning.

  But a small part of him tried to listen.

  Wanted to listen.

  Knew it had to listen.

  Opportunities as precious as this should not be wasted.

  Aglow with reckless might, Torg reversed his course. He left the cloud behind and roared back to his flesh.

  When he returned to life inside the pit on Mount Asubha, his karma tore through his flesh like a bolt of lightning, and he cried out.

  The wizard’s cry startled a pair of sentries who stood near the opening of the pit, and they yelped and leapt backward.

  No sound had come from the pit in more than a week. Everyone at the prison believed the wizard was dead—except for Mala, who claimed to sense the Death-Knower’s essence, no matter how diminished. With the Chain Man stomping around, they were all on edge, including the lookouts. When the sentries heard Torg’s shout, they nearly dropped dead.

  Dawn was approaching, but in these lonely heights the air was as dark as midnight. Enraged winds swept through the gaps between Asubha and its sister mountains. Few places on Triken were as miserable as this peak. Prisoners rarely survived more than a couple of months. Depression and fear grew until they became unbearable. Suicide was common. More often than not, the dead were found frozen at their posts or in their beds—with hopeless looks in their eyes.

  “I’ve got to tell the warden that the wizard still lives,” one of the sentries said, managing to regain some composure. “He’ll want to go straight to Mala. Might even have to wake him.”