The Bohemian Magician
Page 33
The ifrit laughed unctuously. “Oh, I see. ‘Powerful spirits,’ eh?”
“Yes.” Guilhem raised his arms and shouted, “O great Marduk! O immortal Sin! Attend me now!”
With a deafening crash of thunder, a flash of light burst forth over his head. Appearing on either side of him were two mighty, glowing figures, each taller than the ifrit, dressed in long robes, with flowing beards and enormous, staring eyes. The beard of the taller of the two deities was braided. He wore a tall metal helmet and carried a wooden staff. The other god, somewhat shorter, had a beard flowing down over his chest, and a silver crescent adorning his wide-brimmed hat.
The ifrit gasped. “Revered Marduk! Great father! And Lord Sin, god of the Moon!”
“My son, you are far from home,” Marduk rumbled, his voice echoing as though he spoke inside a cave.
The ifrit tapped its claws together in evident distress. “It wasn’t my doing, great lord. This human freed me, so out of a sense of gratitude I followed him here, and—”
“Gratitude! Opportunism, more like. He has bid you depart, yet you remain, preying on his people,” said the Moon god. “You have displeased us, spawn of the desert.”
“Well, I—” The ifrit’s eyes suddenly narrowed. “Wait a minute.” It swung around to face Guilhem. “How do I know this isn’t some sort of trickery?”
“Silence!” Marduk thundered. He pointed a finger at the Moon god. “See!”
Sin vanished in a puff of smoke, replaced by a small, dingy bird: Rámon. Guilhem did not let on that he recognized the familiar. Marduk pointed again and Sin reappeared.
“Well,” said the ifrit, clearly taken aback.
Marduk glared down at him. “You wish further proof? Behold!” As he spoke, a trembling circular opening appeared in the air. Through it a thoroughly alien scene was visible: a landscape of greenish ice where bursts of gas jetted from the ground as stars spun overhead.
“What? W-where—?” the ifrit gobbled.
Marduk said, “Tis a comet, spinning in space far from Earth. One day human astronomers will dub the wretched orb Gorgorleth, but that will be more than two million years in the future. A fire elemental more powerful than you will then be loosed, and—ah, but that is a tale you have no need to hear.” Marduk waved his hand, and the portal vanished.
“And there will we send you, son of the sands, for being so foolish as to have become involved in his schemes,” Sin bellowed.
“But it wasn’t my fault, Mojmir enslaved me!”
“Stop sniveling,” Marduk commanded. “You sicken me. We have dealt appropriately with Mojmir, never fear!” And from a fold in his robe he took the small mole into which the Bohemian magician had been transformed. Its weak eyes blinked in the sudden light.
The ifrit stared wide-eyed at it. “Mojmir it truly is! I smell the scent of him!”
“Yes,” the Moon god said. “And you are next! Perhaps a scorpion, Marduk, what do you think? Or maybe nothing of greater consequence than a sand flea?”
“As you will, my lord,” said Marduk. “I like the mole motif... perhaps make him a golden mole, burrowing beneath the burning sands of the Sahara for eternity.”
“That’s not bad,” said Sin, nodding. “Now,” he said to the cowering ifrit, “ready yourself.” He lifted his arms as though in preparation to wield his powers.
“Unless,” Marduk put in, raising a finger to stay the Moon god’s spell, “unless you quit this place immediately, ifrit, and return to your rightful home. There you may do as you will.”
“I obey! I obey!” The ifrit began spinning, faster and faster, until its form blurred from the speed. It rose into the air and shot off in a southerly direction.
Marduk and Sin followed its departure.
“Nice going, you two,” said Guilhem.
The gods melted away, revealing the forms of Oriabel and Rámon. The bird emitted a squawk and settled his feathers. Oriabel brushed some dust from her sleeves. “There, now,” she said to Rámon. “That wasn’t so bad, now was it?” The bird gave her a cold look but did not deign to reply.
“It appears that what your books said about ifrits was true,” Guilhem said as they started back toward the castle. “They can be easily outwitted.”
“It was a nice idea of yours, to show it that comet off of which the gnomes bounced you.”
“Thank you. I thought an exotic threat was required. What would rattle a desert creature more than an isolated, frozen wasteland?”
“Indeed. You don’t suppose it’ll come back, do you?” Oriabel asked.
“I hope not. But if it does, well... presumably you will have had time to give those books an even closer reading.”
“In the meantime, let us hope for the best.”
“Indeed. It would seem that there is but one detail left to address.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “Oh? And what might that be?”
“The fylgja. Please remove it.”
She looked at him blankly.
He motioned at his abdomen. “The flygja; the, the thing you put inside me to assure my cooperation!”
“Oh, that!” She chuckled. “It was a harmless sprite, you know; it couldn’t have done anything.” She came close and made a few gestures. “It’s gone.”
“Harmless? Couldn’t have hurt me?”
She shook her head. “But you thought it could, and that was sufficient for my purposes.”
He swelled up, about to roar at her, but instead began laughing.
* * *
Within days, it seemed to Guilhem that the adventures he had so recently experienced might not have happened at all. His life returned to its normal routine of levying taxes, mediating peasants’ disputes, dealing with plantings and harvests, hunting, fishing, playing with his baby son, and the like. It was all so normal; even, at times, perhaps a bit boring.
But in a way, that wasn’t at all distressing. There was, he reflected while dandling little Guilhem on his knee, something to be said for normalcy. One didn’t want to spend all of one’s days fighting ogres or flitting around in the form of a mosquito.
On his way home to the castle one evening after a pleasant day spent tramping the countryside he found himself whistling a tune. After a few moments, however, he realized someone else was whistling along with him. Looking around, however, he saw no one.
He stopped in the middle of the path, frowning in puzzlement. “Who’s there?” he called.
A cadre of fairies popped into view. Most of them were considerably better-looking than the average sprite, dressed in diaphanous garb, though there were two or three ill-favored things with absurdly long noses and big bug eyes.
Two, however, a male and a female, were larger than the rest, and wore tiny golden crowns. “Hail,” said the male fairy in a rather self-important voice. “Do we have the honor of speaking with Duke Guilhem IX, of the Aquitaine?”
Guilhem, taken aback at being addressed by name, could nevertheless not resist responding with a bow. The fairy was obviously a personage of importance among his scatter-brained people. “I am he, your grace.”
One of the other fairies, a courtier by the look of him—or her, it was hard to tell—sang out, “You will address King Auberon as Your Effulgent Majesty!”
“Oh? I crave your pardon, then, Your Effulgent Majesty.”
“You shall have it, duke. This is my queen, Titania.”
The fairy female nodded her head regally.
“And the others... Peaseblossom, Mustardseed, Cobweb, Moth...” Auberon frowned. “Where is that rascal, Puck? I don’t see him anywhere.”
Peaseblossom, one of the long-nosed sprites, scoffed. “He’s hanging around that stupid hill again.”
“He’ll be there for days,” said Titania with a sniff.
“I’m afraid you’re right, my dear,” said Auberon. “But no matter!” He turned once more to Guilhem. “We observed you in Bohemia, you see, and were among the crowd at the mosque when you and your consort vanquished Sh’bna
gre. We felt that, seeing you are a fairy friend, it might be amusing to follow you back to your homeland and take up residence for a while. It’s been quite diverting. Nice work getting rid of that disgusting ifrit, by the bye.”
Guilhem could only goggle at them. Having rid himself of one supernatural pest, was he now to suffer an entire troop of them at his very doorstep?
* * *
Oriabel hummed as she bustled about her hovel, setting it to rights after her prolonged absence. Now that spring had arrived, she no longer needed to suffer her winter lodgings in the cave. Her mood was further lightened because, having returned with a substantial amount of elvish gold from the nixies’ treasure tunnels, she could afford to pay for some improvements to her little home, such as a new roof, fixing the fireplace’s loose stones, and procuring purer distillations and more finely ground powders for her potions and incantations.
Knowing that her destiny lay here, in the Aquitaine, among Guilhem IX’s family, also gave her a feeling of satisfaction. Just what the shape of that destiny might be, however, was not yet clear to her.
“Hmm, hmm, hmm; ’twill reveal itself in time,” she murmured as she swept the floor. Meanwhile there were chores to do, love charms to tie, and wart-removing elixirs to decoct.
“What did you say, Mama?” croaked Rámon.
“Nothing, my sweet Rámon, nothing that need concern you.”
The raven fluttered on his perch. “Mama! Mama!”
“Oh, what is it now, Rámon?” she said with a touch of exasperation. As the bird grew older, he demanded more of her attention. Still, he was better company than a toad, and she detested cats.
“Someone comes, along the path!”
She heard the footsteps now; the sound of someone approaching in haste, almost running. Going to her door, she saw Guilhem hurrying toward her, looking back over his shoulder every few moments as though he were being followed.
Or chased, she said to herself. “How now, my lord?” she called.
Guilhem halted on her doorstep, grasping the lintel with both hands and panting. Rarely had she seen him so rattled.
“They are everywhere!” he managed to say after a moment. “I cannot shake them!”
“Calm yourself. Come in, take a dram of elderberry wine.” She poured it for him and he gulped it down. She measured out another tot, which he drank more slowly. “Now, tell me—who is everywhere,” she said, though she was sure she knew.
“The fairies,” he said, wiping his brow. “They infest the castle! They sit atop my bedpost when I am with Phillipa, and make rude remarks; they flit around my head when I meet with Piers... they follow me to the hunt, and when I shoo them away, my men look at me as though I were mad, for they cannot see the wretched creatures.” He shuddered. “And the smell!”
Oriabel frowned, and opened her mouth to speak, but he was not finished. “Everywhere I go, the stables, the kennels, the mews... the absolute worst thing is that little Guilhem can see them and he likes them! He gurgles at their antics.” He paused and heaved a sigh. “What can we do about this? You must help me. I’m going mad!”
Oriabel took a glass of the wine for herself. “Have you tried speaking with them?”
“Of course I have!” He scoffed. “They merely laugh at me and tweak my nose. I tell you, I will soon be raving like a lunatic.”
She held back her observation that he already was.
“And that Puck—he’s the worst,” Guilhem lamented, taking the bottle. “He showed up a week ago accompanied by some bumbling creature with the body of a man and the head of an ass. My people can see him well enough. I had to drive the thing into the forest. He promises to stay there if I provide him with food and drink; lots of drink.” He sighed again. “These fairies... generally I can ignore them, but in these numbers, I find them intolerable. I can’t concentrate on anything. If I try to creep away to write a poem or a song, they follow and make stupid suggestions. Oriabel, I have no one else to turn to. Can you help me?”
“What fools these immortal creatures be,” she said, half to herself. Their presence, she knew, was likely to tangle the delicate skein of fate being woven here for Guilhem’s descendants. She couldn’t allow that to happen. “Very well, my lord, I will see what I can do.”
He grinned. “I knew I could rely on you, my friend! Let us away!”
With that, he marched out the door. Oriabel threw back another quick draught of wine and followed him.
Thanks for reading The Bohemian Magician! If you enjoyed this story, please leave a kind review, and tell a friend! A.L. has more stories to come, so keep your eyes open.
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About the Author
A.L. Sirois is also a developmental editor, graphic artist and a performing musician. He has had fiction published in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, Fantastic, Amazing Stories, and Thema, and online at Electric Spec, Every Day Fiction and Flash Fiction Online, among other publications. His story In the Conservatory was nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Other works include a children's book, Dinosaur Dress Up (Tambourine Press / William Morrow). His graphic novel, THE ENDLESS INCIDENT, based on a video game, was published in February, 2016. Al has been playing drums for over fifty years in rock and jazz combos. As an artist, he has hundreds of drawings, paintings and illustrations to his credit. Al has contributed comic art for DC, Marvel, and Charlton, and has scripted for Warren Publications. He wrote and drew “Bugs in the System” for witzend #12, the famous comics fanzine started by for MAD artist Wally Wood. He lives in Rockingham County, North Carolina with his wife and occasional collaborator, author Grace Marcus.
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The Dragon’s Champion Series by Sam Ferguson
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Table of Contents
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
About the Author
Other Books by Dragon Scale Publishing