Alchemystic

by Anton Strout

  The sounds of approach grew in my ears, but the humans registered no signs of hearing it. “They are coming,” I said. “We must hurry.” Alexandra turned her head to listen, but I touched her face with the smooth stone of my hand. “Now, Alexandra.”

  She pressed the stone in place against my chest, and without bothering to look to the notebook, she incanted the words as if she had always known them. The coil in my chest unwound one last time, her hands moving the gem quickly in place and letting the coil wind back around the last stone, something wild rising up in my body in response. The stones wove themselves into a new pattern, fresh pain filling me as the coiled stone paths within me changed. The shock of it drove me to my knees, and I dug my claws into the side of my maker’s tomb to keep from falling over completely. A searing bolt rose from my chest to the center of my head, a white heat and light rising in me until I could no longer see. My sight was replaced by a flood of images at the center of my mind, rushing back in time to my earliest memories—those of my time with Alexander in old New York. The pain in my chest grew, tearing at the center of my thoughts, and a veil that lay across my memories lifted, pushing my mind further back to a time I had never recalled before, long before my time in Manhattan or even America.

  Images of a green, foreign land washed over me. The trees and rolling hills were different from the ones of the city and its parks, a land of massive stone castles, lords, and servants. This, I could now recall, was Alexander Belarus’s homeland, and at the thought of him, a specific memory hit me. Deep within the stone walls of a castle, my maker’s face rose up before me, still wrinkled at the edges of his eyes but younger than I had ever seen before. I struggled to recall the circumstance of our meeting. So much was strange and new that I was having trouble sorting out all the differences, but before I could process all of it, the now-world forced itself back upon me, a familiar voice filling my ears.

  “You ready for a rematch?” Devon, Alexandra’s brother.

  The voice was close, somewhere in front of me. I focused my mind past the wave of flooding memories to see his bulky stone form standing just on the other side of where Alexandra knelt before me. A rocky swarm of his fellow creatures was pouring into view every which way through the maze of tombs and columns all around us, but my eyes stayed on Devon, his rough and rocky face giving a sinister smile. “What? My first beating wasn’t enough for you?”

  “It is true I cannot hope to beat you on strength alone,” I said, forcing myself back onto my feet through the still-burning pain of the last stone’s placement in my chest. Alexandra stood as well, smart enough to step out of the way. “However, strength alone is not part of my plan.”

  Finding it difficult to concentrate through my fresh swirl of memories, I staggered. As I struggled to find my balance, Devon laughed. “No?”

  “No,” I said, then dashed toward him, spreading my wings as I went. Devon swung at my approach, but I was already rising above him. I grabbed his wrist, his arm still extended from the swing, and I pushed my wings for momentum as I forced myself up. His feet left the ground and we rose despite his efforts to struggle free from my grip.

  His free hand slammed against my shoulder, whole new levels of pain I was unfamiliar with filling me, but I pressed us higher to the top of the catacombs.

  “You confuse me,” I said. “You say you are Alexandra’s family yet you do not act the part.”

  “Enough, Boy Scout,” he said. “What do you know about mortals, anyway? You’re just pissed that you’re not unique anymore. You’re not the only one who gets to live forever.”

  “Is that so important a thing?” I asked, truly wondering. “Living forever?”

  “It is to me,” he said, and drove the balled-up rock of his fist into my face.

  Pain overwhelmed my senses, both that from the blow as well as more memories returning to me. What did I know about mortals? Fresh images of my time before the Americas came to me. My mind reeled as I realized they were mortal times. Human, the body of a young man, made of flesh and so fragile…and so broken, crushed, full of pain. The face of Alexandra’s great-great-grandfather met mine in what struck me as the final moments of my days as a young mortal.

  Devon brought me back into the moment at hand with another blow. My wings collapsed in around me, but I did not let go of him. Alexandra’s brother and I spun in the air as we fell, the tops of the tombs below coming up fast. Despite the pain and disorientation, I forced my wings back open and took to the air before throwing his stone form up in front of me.

  “If living forever at the cost of all others is your only goal, then there is no hope for you,” I said, and struck into him with both of my clawed hands. His screams pierced the air as bits of stone tore away from him, the force of my blows spinning his body through the air, crashing him into one of the ornately carved columns. He collapsed against it, sliding down the side of it, but I grabbed him again, flying higher once again. “Your lack of remorse for your family makes this easier.”

  I tore at him with growing fury, each blow more vicious than the last, his cries of pain becoming weaker with every swipe.

  Only the sensation of Alexandra’s panic stopped me, her brother falling to the floor below, the bulk of his stone body snapping a large granite cross in two.

  “Stanis!” she cried out. I looked down. Alexandra was fending off a circle of incoming stone monstrosities, keeping a tight ball of fallen debris flying around her defensively, bits of it flying out when an open target presented itself. Chunks of rock drove back stone men, but despite her valiant efforts, from up here it was evident that it was only a matter of time until the tide of battle turned. Numbers alone ensured that, and this fight could not be won in such a manner.

  I tucked my wings in and dropped down hard with my full weight crushing one of the stone men. It sank to the floor and moved no more.

  The room was full of the stone legion, and I found my two other friends in the thick of the fight with them farther out in the catacombs. Aurora was using Marshall’s suggestion, toppling many of her foes with the shaft of her pole arm, piles of them clogging the aisles. Marshall himself worked his way through the maze of columns and tombs, leading his foes back to her, but there were too many on him and he was dead-ended against the back wall of the building. Rory ran to him, tripping up several of the stone men in the process, but the pole arm stuck between the legs of the last one she went for and snapped in two. I checked Alexandra again, whose own fight was waning, the circle of debris flying around her thinning out and losing some of its momentum.

  I dove back into the fray, getting between her and several of the approaching stone men, their larger leader watching at the back of their group with Alexandra’s parents each in one of his enormous stone hands.

  “Let them go, Kejetan,” she said, the name driving a spike into my overwhelmed mind.

  “Give up,” said the massive stone form menacing Alexandra, but she stood her ground, my pride in her strength growing.

  That name and that voice…so familiar now. I pressed my newfound memories, going back further until Kejetan’s rocky body appeared in them looking more whole than it did now—less broken, jagged, and chipped away.

  The memory began to take shape—the night my mortal form had died, I realized. The night I was broken. Both this creature and Alexander Belarus had been there.

  “You cannot hope to win,” Kejetan continued, shaking the two human figures he held with both his arms, causing the woman to scream.

  His words rang true, but the raw emotion and physical pain of my broken human form was too fresh in my memories now to simply give up. My panic, fear, confusion drove me and I threw myself back into the fight, needing to embrace the rules set upon me—protect the family. I grabbed the stone man to my left and threw him into one coming up on my right. Chips of rock flew from the impact of the two as they went tumbling, only to be replaced by two more.

  I stepped toward Alexandra as she let her spell go, the floating debri
s all around her falling to the ground.

  “He’s right, you know,” she whispered to me. “We can’t win. I thought restoring your soul stones would make you more powerful.”

  I turned to her, feeling her own wave of raw emotion pouring off of her, mixing with mine. The familiar feel of Alexandra calmed me, helping my mind settle and sort through my new wealth of memories. “Perhaps it has,” I said, surprised to discover I was already formulating a plan. “There are ways to win without physical consequences.”

  “Enough!” Kejetan said, walking forward, pulling the two humans along after him as they struggled to break free. “Long have I waited. Long have I sought Alexander, the betrayer who stole our most sacred secrets.”

  Alexandra stepped forward at the mention of him, defensiveness rolling off her. “My great-great-grandfather was a good and noble man! A Spellmason.”

  “He was a thief,” Kejetan said. “He stole our books of secret knowledge for himself.”

  “Only to keep them from a mad king,” I countered as my memories unfolded. “To keep them from men like you. The alchemy and spell magic in those books were far too much for those desiring power simply for power’s sake. Alexander knew that.” Flashes of the Spellmason filled my head—of him spending time with me as a mortal, teaching me like a son. But though Alexander had treated me as such, I was not his child, despite my desires. My own memories were those of a young man whose father was called the Accursed Lord. “Potent and terrible arcana you were looking to learn, all in a quest to live and rule forever. You even forced Alexander into a life of servitude, to better your hold on the land. When your only son took an interest in the alchemical arts, Alexander could have been cruel to him, but the Spellmason was stronger than that. He chose not to force the sins of the father onto the son. He laid no blame on the boy, training him and dearly loving the son as if he were his own.”

  “No,” Kejetan said, a pained anger in his voice. “Alexander murdered my son and stole our knowledge!”

  “The Spellmason did not murder your son,” I said, my new memories still sorting themselves out. I pulled deeper into the events leading up to the death of my corporeal form that night at the castle. “Did you not cripple your own child by your very hand?”

  “How dare—”

  “You were impatient for power,” I said, cutting him off. “So impatient you even made Alexander put you into that crude stone form before he had a chance to perfect the magic. Your own son begged you to wait, but you refused, further incensed by how strong a bond the boy was forming with the Spellmason. You could not control your mad greed or your jealousy and you lashed out, your son moving to protect Alexander. The strength of your blow in your new and monstrous form was enough to break him, to cripple your only son.”

  Kejetan became agitated, pain pouring out through his angered words. “This form was new to me,” he said. “I could not yet control it.”

  “Your son’s body was broken that night…by you,” I said, feeling the agony of the past creeping over me. “Every second that followed what you did was pain for him.”

  “So Alexander thought to show him mercy and end that?” he asked, his anger growing. “It was not his right!”

  “No,” I said as my past returned to me. “He did show mercy, yes, but not by killing him. Alexander ended your son’s suffering…by taking the boy’s soul from that broken vessel, taking it away, and giving him a new life…in stone. He would not leave him there with as dangerous a man as you. If a lord would do that to his own son, who knows what would happen to others or even to Alexander’s own family? Seeing the boy in that broken form, barely living, was unbearable for the Spellmason. He trapped the boy’s soul, stole away in the night, gathered his family, and vanished from Kobryn and Lithuania for good.”

  “How…how do you know all this?” the ancient lord shouted. “Are these the sort of lies that Alexander filled his greatest creation with?”

  “No. I was there, Father,” I said, my body a mix of unfeeling stone and the pains of the past coursing through it. Was this what if felt like to be alive? I wasn’t sure. There was, in fact, only one thing I was sure about. “I am Stanis Ruthenia, and I remember what you did to me that night.”

  Kejetan fell silent, unable to answer, and when he did his voice came out in a near whisper. “Stanislav?” he said, and I stared into the dark holes of his eyes. He stood silent for a long time. “It has been ages since I have thought upon that night…”

  “I live,” I said. “Thanks to Alexander.”

  “I spent years looking for him, for the man who betrayed me and my people,” Kejetan said, his voice still quiet, lost in dark thoughts. “The one who stole our secrets.”

  My mind flowed with memories of the kind man who had built me, thoughts I had only glimpsed masked as strange dreams upon waking every night. “Alexander created me, taught me, was kind to me.” I stepped away from Kejetan and moved toward my maker’s tomb. “And he lies here, dust and bones, a threat to you no more. Leave these people be.”

  Kejetan’s face turned to pain and he shook his head slowly, anger returning to his voice. “Alexander took much from me,” he said, “and I will be repaid in blood. I will kill all of his kin for leaving me in this monstrous form for centuries.”

  I stepped back toward him, putting myself between him and Alexandra. “Whatever you perceive as the mistakes of Alexander are not the fault of these people,” I said. I let my voice rise when I next spoke, its echo filling the tomb. “You will leave this family be.”

  Kejetan stood, unmoving, but shaking Alexandra’s mother and father in his grip, causing them both to wince. “That is unlikely,” he said. “I have searched too long for what is rightfully mine. I will not stay in this form any longer. I want our secrets back.”

  “You are going to leave here without harming anyone,” I repeated. “Do you understand?”

  “These people will die and then I will reclaim what belongs to my family. To our family.” A sentimental madness filled his eyes.

  “If you do not leave, it is at your own folly,” I said, spreading my wings. “For I am bound to these people. Any move to harm them and I cannot help but defend them. You knew Alexander and what he was capable of. The binding of that Spellmason is strong. You cannot break it and I will be forced by the first rule to protect these people. I will fight until I am torn apart. It is what I am built to do. I will not be able to stop myself. With every last bit of my strength, I will die protecting them, until I crumble. Is that truly what you wish?”

  I saw the conflict on my father’s face as I stood there waiting, every second spread out like a century before me.

  “I wish vengeance,” he admitted, “but not at the price of my son. But I must have our secrets back.”

  The Belarus family would never be safe unless I could make him and his men of stone leave, and I could see only one way of that happening. I did something I had not known I was capable of right up until the moment I spoke.

  “The secrets are in me,” I lied. “Once Alexander put me in this form, he split my soul and hid it from me so I did not have to live with the constant pain of my memories, of what you did to me. In addition, he committed all of his arcane secrets to those stones as well. Now that I am restored, I will share them with you. You and your servants can be shaped and formed like me. I will leave here with you…if you leave this family alone.”

  The room fell silent for a long time, the only sound that of bits of crumbling architecture falling.

  “Very well,” he said.

  Alexandra moved somewhere far behind me. “You’re not going to believe that psychopath, are you?”

  “We need more than just a ‘very well,’” Marshall called over from where he stood with Rory.

  “Your word will be your bond,” I said. “Swear on it.”

  “I shall not seek vengeance on this house,” Kejetan said.

  “That will suffice,” I said, and turned to Alexandra, walking back to where she sto
od alone. I took her hands in mine, the skin soft and soothing to me.

  “You don’t have my great-great-grandfather’s secrets,” she whispered, her eyes concerned. “Do you?”

  “No,” I whispered back, “but it will be some time before they figure that out. In the meantime, learn what you can. Rebuild what your namesake built for you. Prepare yourself.”

  “I didn’t know you were capable of lying,” she said.

  “To tell the truth, neither did I,” I said with a dark smile, “but it is still in service to the first of all rules, is it not? Protect the family.”

  Alexandra nodded, then pressed her forehead to the cool stone of my chest.

  “There is one thing I must ask of you, however,” I said, raising my voice for all to hear. “You must release me.”

  She looked shocked as if I had slapped her, stepping back. “I…I thought restoring you would have already done that,” she said.

  “The Servants of Ruthenia need to know that I am no longer under your control,” I said. “You must release me.”

  She fell silent, squeezing my clawed hands. I could feel her shaking, and the connection we shared filled with sorrow.

  “I don’t know if I can,” she said, her voice quiet, full of reluctance.

  “Do it,” Marshall called over. “For heaven’s sake, Lexi, what’s it even matter now?”

  “It matters,” she shouted, on the verge of tears. “What if I release him and then he becomes like…like them! What if he’s got centuries of bottled-up anger out of being put into servitude by Alexander? What then?”

  “I can speak for myself,” I said, pushing as much calm into her as I could. “What your great-great-grandfather did for me, he did out of kindness. He could not stand what had happened to me. He instilled that kindness within me, making me this grotesque you see before you. That was his gift to me.”

  “You don’t have to do this,” Alexandra said, the pain radiating off her almost unbearable.

  “I know,” I said. “I wish to do it.”