Sleight of Mind (Rise of Magic Book 2)

by Stefon Mears

  He was wrong, as it turned out.

  The moment he touched Mancuso’s fashion sense — the part of his mind about the left ear where Machado began — he sensed the swirling connections of the threads emanating from Mancuso’s solar plexus. It seemed this man trusted his instincts before his intellect after all.

  The core of Mancuso’s instincts swirled in silver and chrome, polished and refined...

  But there was more.

  Machado almost missed it. If he had started from the solar plexus he might have missed it, but having to move there from the mind had sparked Machado’s curiosity. Instead of simply noting the structure, Machado had begun to wonder about the source.

  The first thing Machado touched on was a teenager’s love of gambling and the ability to pick up on nonverbal cues that indicated the motivations behind the plays of other players, beyond what any logic might have explained. It was that core of perception that taught Mancuso to rely on perceptions he could not readily explain.

  But another thread led from this point to the armor, and that did not make sense. Machado could clearly pick up that the armor represented history and family, though more about the legacy he would leave behind than about what he could look back on. That was part of the reason the tapestry depicted him looking out over what he had conquered, not back on where he had come from.

  And yet, that thread indicated protection, which did not fit with the rest. Machado dove into that thread, expecting to find an event in Mancuso’s personal history that would explain the tie, explain how it all worked together.

  Instead, he found a bit of satin amid the silk. A thread that someone else had woven in. Tiny. Artful. Easily missed even by a Magister.

  But this Magister had found it. And he could read the signature of the weaver quite clearly: Tai Shi Li Hua.

  ◊

  Donal awoke stiff and sore. His head pounded as though he had rented his skull out for an anvil. His ribs burned as though the blacksmith had stuck a dozen pokers in there to cool. His hands came to his temples, desperate to rub them. But when he craned to let his head meet his hands, his neck seized.

  Too much pain. Too much frustration. Donal tried to scream.

  The sound came out closer to a whimper.

  Donal settled for shallow breaths until he could control himself enough to shift a bit of consciousness and distract his awareness from the pain.

  Then and only then did Donal open his eyes.

  “A cell?” His voice croaked. Donal hadn’t actually intended to say the words aloud, but the shock of realization had done it. Instead of on his own bed, or even on the floor of his suite, Donal lay on a rough blanket, on a stiff bed attached to the wall. No doubt so it could fold against that wall easily.

  A cage of bars surrounded Donal on three sides, with the dull gray walls, ceiling and floor making up the rest.

  Reflexively Donal reached for a thread of power and found one. Not cut off from his magic then. So either he was being held during an investigation or...

  Donal could not think of anything good to follow that “or” so he let it dangle.

  He lay back, uncomfortable, and tried to work his fingers into the knots in his shoulders and neck. If he lay in a cell, then his gamble had failed. Not only had Li Hua beaten him in the duel, it appeared she had beaten him completely.

  And now Donal lay in a cell. Whatever charge had been filed, he would be found guilty. Li Hua would see to that. Donal felt sure of it. So close to grad school. So close to his doctorate. Only to have it snatched away.

  What would his parents think? What would Bran think?

  Lying on his bunk in what he feared was his new home, Donal Cuthbert began to cry.

  ◊

  Donal’s tears lasted only a moment before the need to act overcame him.

  So Li Hua had beaten him in the Comórtas Draíocht, letting her put him under a geas against disclosing to anyone her plans and her control over Mr. Mancuso. So she had gotten him arrested on some kind of trumped up charges. So she had somehow defeated his twin spells to warn the Magister and Mr. Mancuso himself. And Donal’s current residence implied to him that she had defeated those twin spells and sold the ship’s watch on a story that made Donal look like the guilty party.

  But who knew what she was doing didn’t matter.

  Even Donal going to prison didn’t matter.

  This woman wanted to establish magicians as a ruling class with herself in charge. She had to be stopped. And if Donal was the only one who knew, then he was the only one who could stop her.

  Donal shifted more of his consciousness to allow him to ignore the pain in his head, neck and ribs. He would pay that when he finished his spell, but he would have plenty of time to convalesce later. He sat up and called Fionn forth from the silver faun pendant around his neck, not wasting time to wonder why the guards had been sloppy enough to leave it with him.

  “The spells enacted as desired, Master,” said Fionn. “Ronaldo Machado and Donatello Michelangelo Mancuso received their messages.”

  Donal puzzled over that while the cú sidhe tilted its head and it regarded Donal.

  “You look dreadful. You need rest, food, and a massage, in that order.”

  “I’m in a cell, Fionn. So the messages might have been delivered, but Li Hua has to have undercut them. I don’t know how, but she beat me there too.” Donal shook his head and stood up. “As to your recommendations, I can get the first two later, but the third is probably out of the question.”

  The fae deerhound scrutinized the cell. “But this cell—”

  “We’ll worry about the cell later. Right now we have to stop Li Hua.”

  “She defeated you once already. You must recuperate before attempting to face her again.”

  “I’m not going to challenge her. I’m going to beat her at her own game.”

  “You have no reagents. No incense, oils...”

  “I know. But I’ve got you.” Donal slipped his favorite tool from his shirt sleeve. “And I have my tuning fork. Come on.”

  Donal strode forward and began to cast a circle.

  “Let’s make Li Hua turn herself in.”

  The cú sidhe looked for a moment as though it wished to say something, then flicked its ears in a sort of canine shrug and took up the proper position to aid its master.

  ◊

  Machado thought that tying the influence into Mancuso’s instincts had been a clever touch. The man trusted his instincts, so he would trust what they told them. But that tiny thread of influence in the armor served as a mere tendril. Machado had yet to find the core of the control itself.

  He called Saravá to him and together they began to trace the thread.

  Saravá saw where the thread connected higher into the armor where it would extend through the breastplate and perhaps up into the image of the head, which would strengthen the sympathetic impact of any established control.

  Machado continued the other direction, down the breastplate and into the greaves, and finally into the sabatons. It was there that he found the tiniest trickle fading from the silver of the armor to the grayish white of the rock under Mancuso’s foot.

  But it lead Machado into the rock, and it was there he found the core of the spell. It hid as a duplication of the original rock in the tapestry’s design, but added a touch more gray to indicate that the rock came from deeper in the earth and represented more strength.

  That was key to the spell. The control spells woven in established that this rock supported Mancuso, formed the core of his certainty and confidence, his ability to reliably make the best decisions. That rock formed the foundation of all he had ever accomplished and all he ever would accomplish.

  And that rock’s name was Tai Shi Li Hua.

  Machado paused for a moment to admire the subtlety of the work, the skill and patience necessary to establish that degree and depth of control. Mancuso would weigh her advice above all others. If her familiar carried ideas into the core of the rock, Mancuso
would treat them as his own. They might even manifest through dreams. The poor man would never have had any way to notice that what she implanted came from outside himself.

  But Machado had found the core of the spell, and anything a Journeyman could assemble, Machado could disperse. He would need to take care, though, and work slowly to ensure that he returned everything to its original state. Fine, precise work, of the sort that specialists in magic of the mind excelled at.

  Would that Machado had such a specialist here now. But he could not risk the time to get Mancuso to one. Tai Shi might have woven contingency commands into the spell to protect herself. It needed unweaving as soon as was practical, which meant—

  Just then Pinyin Lung entered the tapestry. Machado turned, tried to raise a defense of the poor man under his care, but whatever the Tai Shi’s spirit dragon familiar had come to do, it abandoned the plan as soon as it detected Machado’s presence.

  The dragon turned tail and fled.

  Machado took advantage of his position deep in Mancuso’s mind to command him to sleep, then withdrew to his own body as fast as possible.

  The moment Machado shook his head, Tunold said, “What’s the verdict?”

  “He’s under Tai Shi’s control. I’ve made him sleep to protect him for now.” Machado stood up. “And she just found out we know.”

  “Let’s go,” said Tunold.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Donal began with a basic circle, dividing all that existed into two categories: that which was within and that which was without.

  Within knelt Donal and his magic.

  Without lay the rest of the universe.

  Such a circle would sever any basic spells on him, cut them off from their caster and their source of power. But it would not free Donal from his geas. The nature of a geas made the magic part of Donal. It would persist until either he died, Li Hua released him, or something greater broke it.

  But Donal did not need to free himself from the geas. He just needed to stop Li Hua.

  That thought sounded fatal in its finality as it flitted through Donal’s head, but he had no intention of killing her. What he needed to stop was her plan, not her breathing. And stopping her plan required two steps.

  The most important step would be the most difficult deception Donal had ever attempted, and he would need to thrust it deep into her mind. He would need to convince her that she had already succeeded so completely that she no longer needed to take any direct action at all. She would see every person and every decision around her as acting in harmony with her goals and plans, interpret every single action as though it worked to fulfill her goals.

  Her direct influence would no longer be necessary. She would have gotten the process to the point that it could continue without her.

  But Donal could not implant so deep and complex an illusion against an awake and aware foe, especially the trained mind of a magician. For this spell to work, he would first have to have her unconscious mind available to him, preferably when she did not have the protection of strong wards. Of course, she never slept outside strong wards, so to create the opportunity, Donal would have to first render her unconscious.

  He had no direct link. No physical tie such as hair or blood, no imagistic tie such as a still illusion. But Donal did have his depth of personal experience with her to draw on. And so he began to build his link memory by memory.

  He began with her smile, then added the amused confidence in her voice when she called someone else’s work “clumsy.” Next he added the flirty arch of her brow, the hint of caramel in her brown eyes, the promise in her tone when she needed to delay a date...

  Memory by memory Donal built the image of Li Hua in his head, crafting his thaumaturgic link bit by bit. From the feel of her hair to the taste of her lips to the camaraderie of theoretical discussions and the passion of their lovemaking, Donal dredged up every detail he could. Each snippet would tighten the link, make his magic that much more effective.

  If Fionn noticed the trickle of tears from its master’s eyes as Donal worked, the fae deerhound gave no sign.

  ◊

  Jacobs leaned forward in his captain’s chair, his hungry eyes on the bright yellow ball of Venus, growing ever larger before him. Still just a ball, but soon he would begin to make out details. Soon he would see the details of its surface. Not long after he would finally set foot on the morning star itself.

  Almost there, thought Jacobs. All systems were reporting in clean, and any minute now Jefferson should be able to reach whatever passed for port authority at Gilgamesh, the first colony on Venus and the only one with anything like a spaceport.

  He rubbed his hands together. Soon his ship would touch down again. Soon the voyage would be over and port authority could officially acknowledge his route, ship’s manifest and passenger list, the three keys necessary to getting Jacobs — as well as the Horizon Cusp and Starchaser Spacelines — officially acknowledged as the first captain, ship and company to successfully complete a commercial voyage from Earth to Venus.

  His last great accomplishment. And then, finally, he would be ready for the ending line of Masefield’s “Sea Fever.” Everyone remembered the line about the tall ship and the star to steer her by. But Jacobs sometimes thought only he remembered the rest, especially the ending, which he had found himself thinking about more and more as the years went by: “And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.”

  Jacobs had sailed the seas, the skies and the stars for more than sixty years. He was ready, at last, for the long trick to be over.

  But he was not done yet.

  “How does she look, Mr. Burke?”

  “Steady as she goes, Captain.”

  “Ms. Jefferson, any word from—”

  “Security report, Sir,” said Jefferson, cutting him off with an urgent tone. “The chief had men around Ms. Tai Shi’s suite.”

  She looked up at Jacobs and he saw fear in her eyes. “A dozen of them, Sir. She took them out.”

  For what felt like the hundredth time on this little three day cruise, Jacobs slapped the control to sound general quarters.

  Why would she bother? Where could she think she’s...

  “Damage Control,” barked Jacobs. “Lock down that hangar bay. Use the emergency repair override.”

  As Jacobs received confirmation of the order, he regarded his miniature gryphon display. Tai Shi now had no escape from the ship, but she might find a place to hide...

  ◊

  Once Donal had his link to Li Hua as strong and clear as he could get it, he held onto it with part of his mind and began the next section of his spell, the part that would separate her from consciousness.

  Donal might have hesitated about this part of his plan, except that he knew he was still aboard the Horizon Cusp, which meant that the ship had yet to land. He knew from a previous voyage that the ship turned prisoners over to port authority before disembarking the rest of their passengers.

  If they were still at space, then Li Hua could not be engaged in anything particularly dangerous.

  True, her sudden collapse would draw attention to Donal, if it happened in the presence of Magister Machado or Initiate Cromartie. But if Donal cast the spell right, to most people she would appear to have collapsed from overwork.

  Here, Donal’s relationship with Li Hua gave him an advantage. He had seen her asleep, seen her falling asleep, seen her so exhausted she could barely keep her eyes open. He knew what every step of the process looked like, sounded like, even felt like, the growing weight in her limbs as she fell asleep.

  At the time, he had paid attention because he had found those little details charming. Now, sad to say, he found them useful.

  Donal focused on those details, first separating the stages and getting them clear in his head. Once he had them isolated and distinct in his mind, Donal crossed his wrists before his chest, tuning fork in his right hand and fingers near his eyes.

  He began the first of a series of
chants to raise the power he needed.

  The initial chant was an internal call to arms, awakening the power Donal stored within himself, rubbing it to moving life, letting it swirl about him, building in the trickle of power that flowed through all living beings.

  Words began to come out of his lips as he summoned the elements to support his cause:

  “Air, flicker of the mind’s whimsy, lend distraction to my power that my foe shall lose her focus.”

  Donal felt the chill of air power join the growing swirl about him.

  “Fire, roar of the mind’s will, lend your consuming power that my foe shall weaken.”

  Donal felt that chill blend with the heat of fire power entering the swirl.

  “Water, slip of the mind’s flexibility, lend fluidity to my power that my foe shall dream while waking.”

  Donal felt the tingle of mist that does not quite touch the skin mix into the swirl of growing power.

  “Earth, foundation of the self, lend solidity to my power that my foe cannot resist.”

  Donal felt the swirl gain fathomless depth.

  Now, where most magicians would have either moved on from the elements or called upon the element of spirit, Donal broke from tradition to go a direction he did not expect Li Hua to have prepared for.

  “Space, limitlessness of the self, lend scope to my power that dwarfs my foe.”

  Where earth had given the swirl depth, Donal now felt space enter the building power and stretch it every direction at once.

  The sudden expansion pressed at Donal’s mind. How could he wrap his head around infinity? Every effort to expand his thoughts to encompass more only created more to encompass.

  But Fionn was there, a counterbalance, a pole with which Donal could resonate, and Donal understood. He did not need to encompass infinity, only embrace it.

  Donal did that, and his power flared brighter than he had ever experienced before.