The Young Magician tlt-1

by Michael Foster

  The Young Magician

  ( The Legacy trilogy - 1 )

  Michael Foster

  Michael Foster

  The Young Magician

  PROLOGUE

  An excerpt from the Book of Helum (10:5:3)

  A thousand years have come and passed since the demon god, Lin, licking his lips with a swipe of his long, dancing tongue, abandoned the ruined carcass of this world, much as you and I would toss aside a finished supper bone. He called his servants from their probing and picking of bones with a resounding howl and they swarmed like fiendish insects back through the unearthly portal that led to their own hellish domain. With the feasting done, there was nothing left to interest them in this world.

  Their mystic gates boomed shut behind them and disappeared with a bang and a crackle of thunder and there was not a hint left behind to suggest the demons’ existence, save the endless sea of sun-bleached bones that littered the ground in every direction.

  However, as someone with a little experience does, the demon god had withdrawn his hordes just before the final hour, sparing the final seeds of life-shivering and sheltering in their tiny hollows-from destruction. He knew how these little things clung to their precious existence and that they would one day thrive again, given half a chance.

  These creatures eventually stumbled back out into the featureless open and, quite to their surprise, they found there was nothing at all waiting to devour them. They blinked up at the blazing sun and felt a rumbling in their stomachs. Some survived long enough to bear their young and some of these survived long enough to do the same. Very slowly, life began to return to the lands, as the trees and grass took root and crept back out from the crooks and crevices.

  The people, made primitive by their long banishment within their caves and refuges, were the last to return, dragging their haggard and wide-eyed families out after them and pointing to the strange and wonderful cities from which their forefathers had fled.

  All the living things began to flourish once more and life soon began to fill the waters and cover the lands; the threat of dark gods soon became a dim vestige in their minds.

  The people returned to some semblance of civilisation and for many generations they continued to prosper. Occasionally, when a shadow passed or a cold shiver danced up their backs, the fear of things all-but-forgotten and of things all-too-terrible would stir within them and they would tremble inside their homes.

  And so they should. Although the demons had departed and the wise-men and magicians insisted such things could not exist, the foul creatures had forged a method of guaranteeing their return, leaving behind them two devices-a lock and a key, of sorts. When the time was right; when man once again covered the earth and had grown great in curiosity or stupidity or both, he would learn how to put these two things together-two devices of such obvious misalignment and such openly-devious intention that even a modicum of common sense should warn that they be kept well-apart.

  But devils know the machinations of man well. Eventually, and with complete and utter certainty, the gates of hell will be opened and the feasting will begin again.

  The years have passed. The nations are swollen and restless. The time is surely upon us.

  A cry came up from the pit and the foreman quickly clambered up the last unsteady rungs of the ladder, wiping the sweat from his reddened cheeks and hurrying into the nearby tent of his employer. Cervantes was sitting before a mountain of maps, papers and surveying apparatus-and he raised his eyes slowly as the foreman stumbled in.

  ‘Yes?’ Cervantes’ voice was slow and calculated, laden with infinite callousness-smooth as honey and dripping with ill humour. The sound of each syllable had the foreman, who had never been intimidated by any man, look at his bootlaces. Never had he met someone who could make his skin crawl in such an uncanny fashion, yet Cervantes did it easily and without effort-without needing to do anything at all except just look back at him with that soulless, blank gaze.

  ‘You had better come see,’ the foreman said as steadily as he could, dabbing at his forehead with a filthy handkerchief. ‘We’ve found something.’

  From the yells and cries outside, Cervantes suspected they had finally found what he had sought all these months. Still, he waited patiently for the foreman’s report. He could never pass up an opportunity to make someone twitch and jitter uncomfortably before him. It was one of the few joys he had left in this far and forsaken corner of the world. Slowly and with practised precision he stood and adjusted his robes neatly into place, pinning the foreman with his unblinking gaze all the while. His ornate black and silver hem swept the sandy floor behind him as he flung back the tent flap and set out into the searing day. The foreman wiped his face again and took a deep breath before hurrying out after his employer.

  The excited workers were gathering at the pit’s edge, shading their faces against the afternoon sun. Some men were still climbing hurriedly out from the digging, clambering and falling over each other, pushing sand over the planked edges with their frantic feet-climbing everything and each other to get out as fast as they could.

  The men parted like water on wax as Cervantes carved them aside with nothing more than his imposing presence, to where he could stand at the digging’s edge.

  Something wonderful was down in the pit, jutting out from the earth. A great stone tablet lay freshly exposed from the soil, wider than a man is tall, angled over and catching the sun as if it had been dropped by some god. The soil around it was melted and glassed, as if by some great heat, and smoke rose slowly from a charred body that lay outstretched near it. One smouldering, blackened arm was reaching up as if, even in death, it was trying to drag itself from the pit.

  All who rimmed the pit were gripped with fear, howling or babbling and staring below with terror-filled eyes-except for one.

  Cervantes’ lips curled into a satisfied smile that would surely have surprised the foreman, had he seen.

  ‘At last.’

  CHAPTER ONE

  The Stream in the Valley

  The boy examined the blemished apple carefully and turned it over in his hands, screwing up his face with concern. Rolling through the mud had certainly done it no good, but with a bit of luck it could still pass a fleeting inspection-so all was not yet lost. He placed it carefully back into his basket and set his gaze back onto the street, peering left and right for any further sign of more escaped fruit.

  Between the many hurrying legs around him, another apple was momentarily visible and in imminent danger of being squished, and the sight roused him immediately into action.

  He hoisted up his basket and was away, darting between the heedless folk around him, scurrying to save the imperilled fruit before it could be kicked or squashed or stomped on any further. Reaching it just in time, he plucked the apple from harm’s way-just as a cluster of bleating lambs came dancing and prancing over the very spot. They kicked up the mud with their skinny hooves as they went, driven before the idle gaze of Mr Shuckle who came whistling and clicking his tongue behind them.

  With the danger passed, the boy finally afforded himself a well-deserved rest and he set his basket down with a sigh. Tracking down so many lost apples had been draining work and he eyed the unwieldy basket beside him with disdain.

  ‘Samuel!’ an angry woman’s voice called out from afar, piercing the market din. The village folk were familiar with the cry, for it was often heard carrying across the noise of the markets on such days as this, full of frustration and wrath. Today, however, the woman sounded especially fearsome and Samuel’s only solace was that her hollering still sounded from far away. He still had a little time to make good of his misfortune before his mother found out.

  He examined the last
recovered apple with a frown and he flicked the dirt from its skin with his finger. Juices oozed from an angry bruise. He pushed at the discolouration with his thumb, hoping it was some trick of his imagination, but more juices fizzed into view with each prod. Alternatives scurried about in his mind: perhaps he could keep the apple and risk a scolding, or-much more appealingly-he could tuck it away into some dark corner and dispose of the evidence altogether.

  He began to eye various crannies and hiding spots around the marketplace, but then he remembered: Mother always had some way of knowing about such things and was sure to find out sooner or later, perhaps even producing the offensive apple itself as evidence and scowling at him darkly.

  So, disappointed, Samuel replaced the bruised apple back with the others. He did, at least, place the most finger-poked side down. Perhaps that would postpone its discovery until much later, when he could be far from Mother and punishment. That thought brought him a brief moment of consolation-but it was cut short by another furious shout.

  ‘Samuel!’ his mother called out again, much louder, much nearer and far more impatiently than before.

  Samuel had become something of a legend for his exploits and many of the other boys envied his adventures, right up until the point when his mother caught hold of him. Then, they would not have filled his shoes for anything. Perhaps that explained why his friends were all now nowhere to be seen.

  Across the street, visible between the legs of all the village folk, Tom peeped out from behind a barrel and waved his arms in warning, pointing back into the depths of the market crowd. Samuel’s mother was coming-and she could slap a boy’s backside before a boy could even begin to squeal with fright.

  ‘Samuel!’ a fearsome voice bellowed, and Mother was there, glaring directly towards him.

  Like a squirrel spying a scrub-hawk, Samuel bolted into action and scurried from the path of danger. He zigged and zagged through the crowd and dragged his apple basket behind him, ignorant to the indignant cries and gasps of protest as he made his desperate way, leaving a trail of bruised knees and scratched legs in his wake.

  Pausing from his flight, he thought he may actually have escaped (if only for the time being at least), but the notion turned out to be substantially ill-conceived. As he sat huddled amidst the busy market folk, thinking himself quite clever and safe, the people beside him-being the treacherous lot they are-moved apart like the curtains of some theatrical performance and his mother was revealed in all her furious glory, not half a step away from him.

  ‘Samuel!’ she growled, looming above and she pinned him by the shoulder with her iron grip. He tried to escape, but his legs flailed around uselessly beneath him. Unsubtle hands turned him about and brought him face to face with a frown and a pointed finger. She did not look at all impressed, by any measure. ‘If I have to call you one more time, I shall be telling your father!’ she scolded. ‘And don’t come crying to me when you get a sore backside!’

  That was that. The final ultimatum had been given. Samuel went limp in her grip as all his resolve fell right out of him and onto the gritty street. She let him back onto his feet and he waved goodbye to his friends, who were each only now emerging from their hiding places. He trudged after his mother, apple basket still in tow, but markedly reduced in its contents. There would be no more fun this day.

  The weight suddenly vanished from his hands as Mother lifted the basket up onto a bench top and she began talking excitedly with the Fish Lady.

  All the children knew her as the Fish Lady. She sold fish, she smelled like fish and she even looked like a fish with her enormous, bulging eyes. Samuel looked at her and had to hold back a giggle, despite his sullen mood. Of course, he would never call her the Fish Lady. Not alone, that is-not without moral support. The Fish Lady could slap his behind as fast as look at him-perhaps nearly as quickly as his mother. He had learned that painful lesson long ago. The Fish Lady and his mother would then talk even longer about how naughty he was and what could be done with him and Samuel certainly did not want that today.

  Still, despite his good behaviour, Mother and the Fish Lady set into a long discussion. To keep him from straying from her side, Mother’s hand kept a firm grip of Samuel’s shirt and it kept hold no matter how hard he squirmed or how long she talked. Time seemed to pass so slowly after that and Samuel wondered if such torture was even allowed.

  He peered between the passing people and carts and loaded wagons for any sight of his friends. There was no sign of them now, but their songs and cheers of excitement rose intermittently above the monotonous chatter around him. Several other women had joined Mother’s side at the stall and were crowding around-pushing into Samuel and bumping him with their handfuls of shopping-to add their various pieces to the discourse.

  ‘Oh, he’s terrible,’ one lady was saying, shaking her head. ‘Someone should set that man straight.’

  ‘I know, dear,’ Samuel’s mother said and the others also chorused their agreement. They continued on in that vein, but the sound quickly lost meaning to Samuel and it joined with the drone of the market hubbub.

  Finally, after what seemed an eternity of boredom, his mother took a few strung fish in hand and they moved on to the next stall, where-almost beyond belief-she began talking all over again. It continued on like that for the remainder of the morning, so that Samuel had nothing but regret for coming to the village today. He kept looking to the rooftops, wishing he could vault up there and spring away to find all manner of adventures instead of being stuck down here with his dreadful, boring mother.

  He had no one to play with at home. His brothers were too old and too serious, always working and busy helping Father. Tom lived not too far away, but he was usually in the village helping his mother and father in their stall and rarely home to visit. Playing with his friends on market day was all Samuel looked forward to, but today Mother was in no mood for games and she had ruined everything.

  ‘I’m in no mood for games,’ she said bluntly as they returned to their cart. She hoisted Samuel up onto the seat and then walked around and untethered old Aaron from the hitching post. After climbing up beside her son, she looked at him with unveiled disappointment, then sighed and shook her head. Picking up the reins, she gave them a sharp flick and clicked with her tongue. The cart groaned as Aaron started forward and they began their bouncing, bumpy journey back home with the slapping of Aaron’s hooves sounding all along the dusty road.

  Samuel looked back with disappointment as the village disappeared between the trees that lined the road and the chanting of ‘Fish Lady! Fish Lady! Fish Lady!’ could be heard rising above the background noise and chatter. There was, after all, safety in numbers.

  Their house stood at the end of a long, curving track, overhung with apple trees, each drooping with ripening fruit. The orchards further west invariably matured first, but theirs, Samuel was always proud to note, were famous for their quality. Father, too, beamed with pride when people made comment on his fruit. The merchants often paid a good deal more for the fruit of his labours than for that of any other orchard. When Father was asked how it was that all his fruit was so good, he always replied ‘hard work and good land’, which seemed sensible enough to Samuel.

  Their farm was quite near to the village, but still far enough into the hills so that he could roam freely in the endless woods without fear of coming across anyone else, and this was what he liked to do most of all. He could wander for hours and hours on the rising hillside, playing all sorts of games and having all sorts of adventures. Sometimes, he would take Tom up there and they would hunt each other, playing ‘soldiers’ or ‘gut the bandit’. Samuel had no idea why it was called ‘gut the bandit’ and not ‘get the bandit’, but his mother always made an unpleasant face when he mentioned its name, so that was reason enough to make it a game worthwhile.

  The narrow front door of their house swung open as Mother brought the wagon to a lurching halt. Lee came out and walked down to meet them, rubbing old Aaron affectio
nately on his sweat-sheened neck. He was the tallest in the family and nearly as strong as Father, although much leaner. He was also the quietest, seeing to his chores methodically and efficiently, while Jason and James wasted a portion of each morning joking or quibbling before Father would have to clear his throat or cough and the pair would quickly get back to work. Father rarely lost his temper, but the few times he did kept everyone well behaved.

  ‘How is Jason faring?’ Mother asked Lee with some concern.

  ‘He’ll live,’ Samuel’s brother replied bluntly as he drew a great flour sack down from the wagon into his arms. His mother seemed worried for a moment, then rubbed her brow with her sleeve and turned to her younger son.

  ‘Perhaps you could do some chores for me today, Samuel,’ she suggested as she gathered up the string of fish and stepped down to the ground.

  Samuel hopped from the cart. ‘Yes, Mother,’ he answered, nodding. He did sometimes do chores, but with his brothers and sister to do all the real work, he knew he was not really needed. Besides, he was far too small to do anything very useful.

  Watching Lee carry the great sack of flour into the house, Samuel wondered what it would be like to be grown. He wanted to be as strong as his brothers-as strong as Lee-but he also noticed how they had considerably less time to play. Perhaps this was not entirely a fair trade. When he was grown, Samuel was sure he would still play games and wander through the woods and spend as many afternoons as possible lying on his back by the river, bathing in the sun, then running and splashing in the water as he pleased. There was something wrong for grown-ups to take matters so seriously and leave such little time for adventures. It just didn’t seem to make sense.

  Dragging the apple basket from the seat, the daydreaming boy waddled inside. The wooden floor creaked as he stepped through the doorway. Their house squeaked a lot and made all kinds of other noises, especially at night and especially when it was stormy. Father was forever fixing one part of it or another and Samuel supposed it was just the way of old things to be so noisy and easily broken.