by Des Pensable
‘Well, you still proved your point, Quab. You did successfully ambush me. Thanks for all your help today, and I’m keen for another session tomorrow if you’ve got the time.’
‘Good then let’s make it tomorrow at dawn.’
The two of them walked back to Quab’s sanctuary without further discussion; each thinking of what he had learnt about the other. Aquitain retrieved his body shell and returned to his workshop.
Later that night Zephira dropped in for a chat, to find him sitting thinking.
‘What’s up?’
Aquitain indicated that they should mindlink and Zephira agreed.
‘I suspect that the High Wizard is still suspicious about us for some reason.
I set up wards to secure this room the first night I was here, but I also had Alpha watching. A rat has been coming in checking on me.’
‘How do you know? It could have been just looking for food,’ suggested Zephira.
‘Firstly, any good wizard knows that you can’t set wards to go off on small rodents or insects, otherwise your wards would be going off all the time. So anyone shape changed to a rat can normally breach wards without being discovered.
‘Secondly, the rat doesn’t search for food but watches me for five minutes and leaves. This morning I took out that ball of clay I was given by my mother to examine again. The rat saw it and disappeared quickly. Five minutes later Featherdown showed up for a visit. I showed it to him and he wasn’t that interested, but suggested I check it out in Old Hoary’s Encyclopaedia of all Things Magical, then left.
‘A quarter of an hour later, Quab turned up to give me some lessons on shape changing. So I locked up and went with him, leaving Alpha guarding the workshop. Guess what happened after I left? The rat came and examined the ball of clay. I think the rat was Featherdown, and I think he knows what the ball of clay does.’
‘Did you learn anything about Quab?’
‘Yes. He’s a damn good shape changer and seems to know just about everything about creatures and shape changing. We’ve been working at it all day. I can now change into a constrictor shape. Do you want to see it?’
Zephira nodded, so he shape changed. He must have been convincing, because she backed away from him as he slithered towards her, hissing.
‘Stop it, Aquitain. You’re scaring me!’ she yelled, so he changed back, smiling.
‘What do you think?’
‘That was too real Rob. I’m getting worried about you. I hope Granddad hurries up and gets your real body back. I’m getting sick of this place and I want to go home.’
‘Why? What’s up?’ said Aquitain immediately suspecting a problem, as up until now Zephira had really liked the place.
‘It’s that Curbut bastard. He’s continually making nasty comments about you and he’s probably running me down as well. One of the young wizards who listens to him a lot has stopped defender training.’
‘Is that all?’ asked Aquitain knowing Zephira’s moods very well.
‘Well no,’ she said. ‘Remember that bard that wanted to whisk me into bed the first night that we were here. Well I saw him each night for a few nights after that and then he told me he had to leave, since he had a singing gig at another town for a week. He said that he’d be back again, but he’s not back yet.’
‘Do you like him?’ asked Aquitain, already knowing the answer.
‘A little,’ said Zephira. ‘He’s much more fun than anyone else I’ve met here. They’ll all refugees from other worlds where they didn’t fit in, and they don’t really fit in that well here either. Do you know he’s spent most of his life traveling around other worlds singing? He’s even sung in Panmagica.’
‘Really!’ said Aquitain, suspiciously. ‘Did he say which town he was going to?’
‘No,’ said Zephira. ‘Why?’
‘No particular reason,’ said Aquitain. ‘What’s his name?’
‘Chantalot Rhythms-Grande. Great name isn’t it - but it’s not his real name of course.’
They chatted for another half an hour, then Zephira left to rest. Aquitain sat thinking again. If he was Featherdown and two people showed up on his doorstep at short notice with strange stories, then he’d be suspicious of them, especially if there was something here to hide, as Zephira had originally suspected. Featherdown would have them thoroughly checked out.
Jaztrix had him under frequent observation and the bard was taking a keen interest in Zephira. Today Quab had suddenly decided to help Aquitain, but at the same time was checking out his shape changing abilities. Why were they so interested in him and Zephira? Why the interest in his ball of clay? Perhaps it was time for him to do a little checking on them. However, it would have to wait as he was tired, so he settled into his shell for a rest; tomorrow was likely to be another interesting day.
**
Featherdown appeared outside Quab’s cottage, greeted him and they went inside. ‘Is it safe?’ he asked.
‘Yes, the ward’s up, and the grounds are clear,’ replied Quab.
‘I’ve got news back,’ said Featherdown. ‘Chantalot’s back. Their stories seem to check out. An archon arrested a political activist in Panmagica about the same time Aquitain and Zephira came here. There is also a current arrest warrant out for Aquitain for violating a Panmagica law about using forbidden magic. I would have been relieved about this until I saw what he had this morning. It looks like a ball of clay but I saw one like it years ago in the hands of a Yith mind wizard. In the Yith’s hand it turned into a marvellous sword that seemed unbreakable. That’s why I wanted your opinion about him.’
‘I had an interesting day with him,’ said Quab. ‘I set up a divination to detect whether he was aligned with any religious groups, but it found none. He is an astute learner and seems honest enough. However, I did find out one very interesting thing about him. His body is certainly that of an unusual type of slime creature, but he’s got a truly natural ability to shape change, and that’s unknown in newmans. So it must come from the body.
‘He’s not in full control of it yet so I think he’s here to learn how to use it and he’s learning fast. He’s got a good eye for detail. He learnt how to change to a snake today. Normally that would take a good druid student a week.
‘Miranda met him when he first arrived. She mentioned that he’d asked about the druid Alin Amber. Currently, the Council thinks that he’s on world but nobody’s quite sure where. It’s possible that Aquitain came here to find this druid to help him learn to shape change, but he may have an ulterior motive as well.’
‘Hmm ... It seems like this Alin Amber fellow may hold the answer as to why they’re here,’ said Featherdown. ‘I think we need to track the fellow down and find out what the connection is before Aquitain goes looking for him. Can you get someone onto it? I’ll try to keep Aquitain occupied.’
‘I think I know what might keep him occupied as well. He seemed quite interested in my female colleague Miranda, although it might be hard to get her interested in him if she sees him as a man,’ said Quab.
‘Well give it a try. Who knows, she might like slimy men,’ replied Featherdown with a chuckle.
**
Kelnor relaxed in his bed, after having had his way with one of the young novice priestesses, and drifted into sleep. Granddad, alias ArchMind Sol Theolaur, and four men dressed in black, appeared out of thin air beside Kelnor’s bed. One of the men went to guard the door, another the window, the remaining two gently slipped loops of soft leather around Kelnor’s wrists and waited.
‘Time to find out what you’ve been up to Kelnor,’ Granddad whispered as he created a zone of magical silence centred on the bed, then gently slapped Kelnor’s face to awaken him.
Kelnor snapped awake, felt his arms restrained, looked up and saw the wizard looking down at him. He tried to scream for help but no noise came out of his mouth. Fear gripped him as Sol reached down and touched him on the forehead with his index finger. Kelnor’s eyes glazed over and his body relaxed as his mind
was dominated. Using mindspeak, Sol instructed one of his men to bring him a chair, and he sat down casually to begin the interrogation.
Half an hour later, Sol was happy that he knew all that was of interest. He inserted a false memory of how Kelnor had been slighted by the High Priest of the Forever Chaste Temple, who was secretly harbouring a mind wizard among their priests. He sowed seeds of doubt about the Theolaur family possessing any mental powers. After all, he had investigated them before and found nothing. His efforts would be much better spent trying to find the mind wizard in the Forever Chaste Temple. He erased any memory of the visit from Kelnor’s mind, and put him to sleep dreaming about the lovely young priestesses in his temple, then Sol and his men disappeared.
In the morning after an austere breakfast Kelnor began looking through the latest incoming correspondence, and noticed one from a spy he had located on the world of Mudrun. He opened that first and after reading through the usual uninteresting local gossip he suddenly sat bolt upright in his chair. The spy reported that a Logicon wizard and a female wizard defender had arrived in Twin Towers and were involved with the High Wizard in some as yet undisclosed way.
Kelnor called for his assistant.
‘It seems we’ve caught up with the Secretary of the Wizard Guild’s grandson at a surprising location. Call the headquarters of the archons and get them to send over the one that’s been chasing the Logicon. I wish to speak with him. Tell them I think I might know his present whereabouts, and also that I wish to change the warrant for his arrest to one of murder for that other fellow found dead in the Logicon embassy. That ought to make things interesting.’
‘Also I’ve heard it rumoured that the Temple of the Forever Chaste has a mind wizard among their priests. I want to direct some effort into checking that out. Pull our agents off Sol Theolaur and start investigating those schemers in Forever Chaste. It’s quite disgusting to think that any member temple of the Unity of Wisdom would harbor a mind wizard.’
‘Quite right, Your Holiness, I’ll get onto it right away.’ said his assistant as Kelnor thought of his special plantations growing on Mudrun. They were making him a fortune. He didn’t want them compromised in any way.
‘Maybe that cunning old wizard Sol Theolaur sent his grandson there to get something on me that he could use to trade for his grandson’s release,’ thought Kelnor.
‘Maybe I should take a few days off and go there for a surprise visit to check out the plantations and find out a bit about this Logicon firsthand.’
Chapter 10 Chaos Matter
After a short rest Aquitain awoke around midnight. Since there were several hours left before dawn he decided to check the Old Hoary’s Encyclopaedia in the library for any information about the ball of clay. The library door was unlocked so he entered and found the area well illuminated by yellow light balls. To one side of the room stood shelves stacked with several hundred books on all sorts of topics. On the other side was a mosaic of pigeonholes containing scrolls all neatly tied with coloured ribbons. In the middle of the room was a small circular table surrounded by four chairs.
He first checked through the books and then the scrolls. None were on magic and none were in the Yith language, although there were quite a number in other languages. The Old Hoary’s Encyclopaedia wasn’t to be found either. There was either another hidden room or the books had been removed. He used his power to see the emanations of magic, but looking around saw nothing. He thought for a few moments then decided to try something different.
In his Logicon form his vision was impaired, but his sense of smell and hearing were considerably more acute. If he could smell where people had moved within the room he might be able to detect any secret doors. He returned to the entrance and reformed as a Logicon; immediately he could taste two distinct footprints on the floor, one covering a larger area than the other, possibly a human and a gnome. He followed them and both led to the same location, a bookshelf against one of the walls.
He slid up the edge of the bookshelf and located by smell and taste exactly what he was looking for, the taste of sweaty hands. The spot had the smell of both newman and gnome sweat. He shape changed to his human form and examined the area. The wood on the side of the bookcase was slightly darkened with sweat from the touch of hands. He placed one palm over the area and felt a surge of magic. He looked around the room and noticed that on the floor just inside the library entrance a teleport ring had appeared.
‘Very cunning,’ he thought. Featherdown had obviously planned to see how good he was at finding the real library. On thinking back, the High Wizard had suggested he visit the library two or three times, without ever mentioning the trick of how to get there. He stepped onto the teleport circle and materialised inside a small well-illuminated room which contained another few hundred books and scrolls, a small table and one chair. This time most of the books and scrolls were on magic and in a multitude of languages.
It didn’t take long to find the Yith section; it occupied almost a complete bookshelf and consisted of over a hundred volumes. The Old Hoary’s Encyclopaedia was next to it, as Featherdown had said it would be. This immediately posed a problem. Had the High Wizard left the encyclopaedia in the general library, Aquitain would have probably never bothered to find this secret library with the Yith books. Did Featherdown want Aquitain to find the Yith books for some reason? If so, how would he know unless Aquitain was being watched?
There was one way to find out. He caused all the light in the room to disappear, leaving him standing in absolute darkness. He then changed to his Logicon form to use its more sensitive hearing ability. He heard nothing but almost immediately picked up the scent of a gnome, then sent up several pseudopodia and waved them in the air to get a sense of the direction of the gnome and slithered towards it. It knew it had been spotted and darted quickly across the top of a bookshelf. This time he heard the faint scratching of claws. He stopped for a moment to think about this. The creature was smaller than a gnome but had claws. Maybe it was a rat or perhaps a gnome pretending to be a rat.
He shape changed back to his human form, turned the light back on and said ‘Show yourself Jaztrix. I know that you’re here.’
A gnome poked his head over the top of the bookshelf.
‘That was pretty good, Aquitain,’ she said. ‘I was sure you wouldn’t be able to detect me.’
‘Why are you up there?’
‘I was here looking for a book when you came in. I was surprised, as I didn’t expect anyone at this hour, so I went invisible and got up here to see who it was.’
Aquitain looked very closely at the clothes that the gnome wore and the illusion broke. She was naked. So she had been a rat, and had shape shifted back to her gnome form to fool Aquitain. It wasn’t too hard to guess who the rat sneaking into his workshop was likely to have been.
‘Well you know now, so you can come down.’
‘I was tired anyway,’ said Jaztrix. ‘I think I’ll turn in for the night.’ She floated down to the floor walked to the edge of a bookcase, touched its side and a teleport ring appeared, and she vanished.
‘Now how about you really leave,’ suggested Aquitain. ‘Or tell me why you’re spying on me.’
Jaztrix reappeared at the top of the bookcase. ‘I must be losing my touch. I could have sworn that you’d believe that I left,’ she said.
‘I have been spying on you and everyone else because my master doesn’t trust anyone in Twin Towers. Why I don’t know. I also know he’s pretty interested in you and your woman friend.’
‘I’d still like to learn how to do illusions,’ said Aquitain.
‘I’ll think about it,’ said the gnome. ‘What are you looking for in here, anyhow?’
‘The High Wizard suggested that I check in Old Hoary’s Encyclopaedia for some information that I’m after, and there it is.’ said Aquitain, pointing at it.
He moved the book to the little table and went to check the index for ideas as to where he should look, to find that t
here was no index. On carefully examining the volume he noted that the index pages had been cut out. He closed the book and looked carefully at it. One of the pages had been removed. He opened it to identify the missing page. The previous section was about chalices, describing different types of magic often found in them, and mentioning notable named chalices.
‘You’ll have to tell Featherdown that someone has damaged his copy of Old Hoary’s Encyclopaedia, the index is missing.’
He returned the encyclopaedia to its place and began to go systematically through the titles on the shelves. Some were standard texts, others were in languages that he had never seen; and then he discovered some on mind magic. He moved the lot of them onto the small table and began to read the first.
‘Are you going to read all of them?’ asked Jaztrix. ‘That’ll take weeks.’
‘Perhaps, but this is the stuff that I’m interested in,’ said Aquitain.
‘I’d be interested in the Yith stuff if I knew how to read it,’ said Jaz. ‘But there is one there with some interesting pictures in it. It’s the one that looks like it’s been torn in half. I think I’ll go to bed now. Bye.’
He read for a few hours, skimming through a dozen books for anything new, and then realised that it must be past dawn and that Quab was expecting him. So he hurriedly returned the books he had read to the shelf, leaving the unread ones on the table and quickly returned to his workshop, only to find two notes on the door: one from Quab and one from Zephira.
Quab’s note said that he had been urgently called away on business and would be back in a few days. He suggested Aquitain shape change into a snake and practice travelling over different ground types, such as sand, swampy mud and water, which could all be found to the north of Quab’s sanctuary. Zephira’s note stated that she had received some good news. She would tell him tonight. Having no other commitments, he returned to the library and this time felt it was time to have a look at some of the Yith books to see if he could make any sense out of them.
