Secret of the Sixth Magic

by Lyndon Hardy

  “Delia,” she replied. “But that is unimportant. Please examine what I have to offer.”

  Jemidon looked down at the countertop and grabbed at the tangle of wire that was closest. “Ah, you mean puzzles,” he said as he recognized the objects. “I am afraid you will find that few of the pages and runners will care for such things. But with me, you are in luck. I have played with such baubles for years. Unlike my experience in the arts, I seem to have some knack with them. Watch how quickly this one can be undone.”

  Jemidon closed his eyes for a second to recall the sequence of moves. He grunted in satisfaction that the memory was still there. Then he deftly whirled the wires through a blurring pattern and, with a dramatic flourish, dropped the puzzle onto the counter. The wires tingled dully but remained in a tangle.

  “Let me see that again,” he said in disbelief. “I must have made a wrong move. It has been some time since I worked this one in particular.”

  Jemidon picked up the puzzle and closely scrutinized the bends and runs. “Yes, there is a difference here. The outer loop on the larger wire whirls to the left rather than to the right. That means…”

  His voice trailed off as he shut his eyes and ran through the sequences again. “Very clever.” He opened them with a grin a moment later. “It makes the ending the mirror image of what one would expect.”

  With a rush only slightly slower than the first time, he completed the altered moves and tossed the decoupled pieces back onto the counter. “Most unusual. Do you have any more like that? I thought I had tried all there was to be found in Arcadia.”

  “Have him pay or make room for the next.” A deep voice sounded from behind the partition. “Your job, girl, is to sell the merchandise, not bat eyelashes at the patrons. Melizar wants a filled purse in a fortnight. No less will do.”

  The curtain swept aside and a short, dark-haired man entered to stand beside Delia. Bushy eyebrows and mustache framed eyes dark as coals. The lips pulled up in a wide grin, revealing yellow, stained teeth and whitish gums. He grasped her bare arm in a viselike grip: although the flesh paled from the pressure, she bit her lip and did not speak.

  “This evening we must do better, Delia,” he said. “On the other islands, they were poor and a token was hard to pry loose. But here we have the jangle of copper and silver from the mainland. Why, even this gentleman carries a coin of gold. Tonight there will be no excuse. Fill the purse as you have been directed, or else you will learn more of my pastimes in the room behind.”

  Jemidon looked at Delia’s suddenly frozen expression and impulsively he wrestled with his pouch to produce a coin. “Here, let her go. She has served her purpose well. And know that it is because of her that I buy one of these trinkets. From you, there would have been no sale.”

  “I am Drandor the trader,” the small man said, stretching his smile even further as he released his grip. “And I see you are a gentleman of discerning taste. Perhaps some other item from far away would pique your interest as well.” He swept his arm in a large arc while making a bow. “Here in the back are the better items that cannot be bartered for less than true gold or tokens of the islands.”

  Jemidon looked at Delia rubbing her arm, her lips still set firm. “You have no cause,” he said. “It is not her fault that your tent is not abuzz with gawkers like the others. Raise up a flap or two. Add some light and sound.”

  “My partner, Melizar, wants buyers, not ones who only look and then go their way,” Drandor said. “And do not waste any thoughts on the girl. She is not a bondsman with rights and privileges, but fully indentured, no different from a lute, a painted vase, or any other item I have to sell. I can do with her what I will.”

  Drandor followed Jemidon’s eyes back to Delia and grunted. “Unless, of course, the gentleman is sufficiently smitten to bargain for her as well. Although I warn you, the price will be dear. She cost no less than fifteen tokens in the exchanges at Pluton. And it would take much more to compensate for my lost pleasures, if she were to go.”

  Delia reached out her hand and placed it on Jemidon’s, which was resting on the counter, her eyes opening wide in sudden expectancy. He looked into their deepness and sucked in his breath. If he had a purse of gold, impulsively, he knew how he would spend it. Only with a determined effort was he able to will his faltering attention back to Drandor.

  “You mentioned items from faraway lands,” he said quickly. “Perhaps there will be something more to my liking.”

  Drandor grunted and pulled aside the curtain. Jemidon rounded the counter and stepped into the rear portion of the tent. Bolts of cloth, stacked precariously, towered on one side of the entrance. Cases of spices, their aromas competing for attention, framed the other. Huge bottles filled with dense green swamp gas lined the far wall in front of another tentflap that must lead to a final compartment beyond. A small furnace with coals still smoldering stood beneath a large wooden frame, from which hung a collection of shackles, spikes, and chains. Pokers and tongs, their tips thrust into the cooling sand, still glowed a dull cherry red. Scattered about were sketches of terrified women straining against their bonds to avoid the touch of searing iron. One was draped carelessly over the body of a small rodent, its limbs bound to a small wooden frame by tightly turned loops of thin wire and its crushed skull lying in a pool of blood. Near the center of the tent, stringed instruments and long, hollow reeds lay in a jumble on top of a pile of small drums, their heads pulled tight by tiny weights spaced around their rims.

  From a cage in a far corner, cloaked in shadow, Jemidon heard a canine growl, followed by another deeper than the first. Instinctively, he froze and held his breath. He had encountered large mastiffs before, but somehow these guttural rolls touched a primitive nerve. It had been a warning, and he knew he would not be given another.

  “Not now, my pretties,” Drandor said. “This is for business.”

  A single paw thudded against the framework in defiant protest, and then there was silence. Jemidon slowly let out his breath. He peered into the pen, trying to see what could shake a crate so large and stoutly built; but except for four burning eyes, there was only blackness. He smoothed the short hairs on the back of his neck and glanced over the other stacks and containers.

  “And what is that?” he asked with forced casualness, pointing at a lattice of wires and beads that stood waist-high to his left. “Another puzzle that I have not seen before?”

  Part of the structure resembled a model scaffolding, with struts at right angles methodically outlining an array of touching cubes. But other lines of differing colors radiated from the vertices at odd angles, creating amorphous bulges and isolated tendrils that snaked into the air. Some of the nodes where many lines came together were encased in intricately carved and brightly colored beads. Even from a distance, Jemidon saw that with the proper twist a bead could be decoupled and slid along one of the wires to the next vertex down the line.

  He reached to touch the curious structure, but a high-pitched voice cut him short. “Property of my master, property of Melizar,” it said. “I am a guardian, and you must not touch.”

  Jemidon looked upward and saw that the light from one of the lamps was not produced by a flame, but by the incandescence of a tiny imp, flittering brightly in a glass prison. Its large head was in grotesque proportion to the delicate limbs and gossamer wings. One eye seemed swollen shut from a wart that covered most of one jowl and sprouted three coarse black hairs as thick as nails.

  “An imp in a bottle,” Jemidon wondered aloud. “Why, after the archmage battled the demon prince years ago, I thought all wizards abandoned such indiscretions. You deal in marvels indeed.”

  “Like the lattice, there are a few items not for sale,” Drandor said quickly. He glanced at the flap leading to the third compartment and then spoke as if he were on a stage, enunciating each word so that everyone listening could hear. “The imp and the drums are the private property of my partner. He merely stores them here while—while he rests. The pets
are a gift from him to me.”

  Drandor paused, watching the tentflap, apparently awaiting a reaction. The canvas rippled slightly and a wave of cold air sluggishly rolled underneath the gap above the floor rugs, but nothing else happened. Drandor let out his breath and turned his attention back to Jemidon.

  “But no matter. What else, what else?” he suggested. “State your pleasure. I can satisfy a prince with what I have in stock today.”

  Jemidon watched the flap a moment more as the cold coiled about his ankles. But the canvas hung straight. Except for the gentle breathing of the mastiffs, he heard nothing. With a shrug, he turned back to what had originally attracted his interest.

  “I have only copper,” he said absently as he studied first the imp and then the lattice underneath. “The gold around my neck I will not part with for any of this.”

  “Only copper!” Drandor exclaimed. “Copper and no gold! I am to show these choice wares only to those willing to pay, and in a discreet manner besides. Melizar wills it so. Take your imposturing to another tent, where they are more gullible and less prudent with their precious time.”

  Drandor grabbed Jemidon by the arm, but he shrugged the trader off. “A moment, just a moment more. There is some pattern about the way the struts leave the central cube at an angle. See, with a few more cross bracings, they would form another symmetry there.”

  “Begone, I say.” Drandor reached for Jemidon a second time but then stopped as a blast of trumpets suddenly pierced the air.

  A muted cry soaked through the heavy canvas of the tent. “The high prince. The high prince. He disembarks in an hour for the first night of illusions at the hall. Bondsmen of the prince and his retinue, attend unto your lords.”

  Farnel and his sorceries popped back into Jemidon’s mind, and he knew that time enough had been spent at the bazaar. Despite his reluctance, he must immediately return. There would be little time left now in which to prepare. He looked at Drandor’s scowl and again at the cage in the corner. With an irritated wave, he indicated that he was going.

  “I will return, Drandor,” he called as he passed through the front tent. “There is much here that interests me.” He cast one glance back at Delia, standing like a statue behind the counter. “Yes, much more that I would like to understand exceedingly well.”

  Farnel’s reaction upon Jemidon’s return was an energetic one. “Tonight,” the master said. “We must present what we have tonight. My peers will determine the final list at the end of the audition session that is taking place now. They will make the selection and be done with it, so that the winners have time to prepare.”

  “But as you have said, we are not quite ready,” Jemidon replied. “Only the barest of sketches with no substance behind any of them.”

  “It cannot be helped.” Farnel waved away the words. “Get the stool and observe what I have put together. Note the jumpy transitions and any other major flaws. If it holds together well enough, we will go to the hall immediately and demand to be heard.”

  Jemidon climbed up on the stool. Farnel stood at the opposite side of the room, adjusted his robe, and then, without preamble, rattled off the glamour. With surprising quickness, the sketch on the first sheet seemed to spring to life; the mountain felt real, the distant thunder forewarned of the approaching storm. Jemidon saw the blur of troops and heard the oration on horseback and the yell as the two seas of men poured toward each other. In rapid succession, the images flitted by, each indistinct and lacking in detail, but somehow capturing the depth of feeling that ultimately would be there.

  And through it all, Jemidon was keenly aware of his real surroundings. The hard stool was uncomfortable; the smells of yesterday’s meal still hung in the air. In the periphery of his vision, the disarray of the hut had not gone away. He felt the freedom to engage or ignore the images as he chose. Idly, he broke focus and sought out Farnel to see how he gestured as he ran through the charm. Once Jemidon concentrated on looking, the sorcerer sprang into view. His eyes wide and staring, Farnel continued mouthing the charm.

  Then, without warning, the master’s eyes bulged even further. He grabbed at his throat, and a dry rasp escaped, instead of a sonorous tone. In an instant the spell was broken. The mountains, the lightning, the cavalry, all vanished in a flash. Jemidon saw only Farnel in his hut, the master falling to his knees and emitting retching sounds as he sagged.

  Jemidon sprang from the stool and ran to where the sorcerer had collapsed into a tight ball, clutching his throat with one hand and holding his other arm tightly to his stomach.

  “Farnel, Farnel, what happened?” Jemidon yelled. “Why did you lose control?”

  The sorcerer’s eyes twitched rapidly from left to right. He lolled his head to the side. “Gerilac,” he croaked. “The reason for the restraint at the meeting. I should have known. A few drops of some depressant in the wine would have done it. Enough for me to lose my voice and falter. He knew the prince would come today and that it would be our very last chance to audition.”

  Jemidon stepped back, giving the sorcerer room, and then helped him struggle up on one elbow. “He fears my entry into the competition,” Farnel said. “He fears it! Now more than ever, I must go on.”

  The master rose to sitting, and Jemidon offered an arm to pull him up. The sorcerer wavered a moment and then lowered himself back to the floor with a groan. “It is not done yet,” he said weakly. “I can feel the backlash stirring in my head. It will be several days before I can attempt another spell.”

  “But the selection,” Jemidon said. “You told me we must hurry or be too late to be considered.”

  “You will have to cast the glamours. Gather up the outline. I will accompany as best I can.”

  “The glamours! I do not know a tenth of what is needed and none had I practiced, for them to go well.”

  “You said you had practiced,” Farnel growled.

  “Studied, yes,” Jemidon said. “Studied but not practiced. It is an entirely different thing.” The feeling of what suddenly was being asked of him began to brew inside. Of course he knew he finally must prove his capabilities to Farnel, but not like this, not until he was truly ready.

  “It is only a quick skim-through,” Farnel insisted. “Just set up the stage and cast a light Power of Suggestion. It is the first one that I taught you. The masters have seen many such outlines. They will be able to extrapolate to the quality that is there.”

  Jemidon started to say more; but, from the look in Farnel’s eyes, he knew that further argument was useless. Reluctantly, he gathered up the sheets and bound them to an easelboard. “Rest on my shoulder as we go,” he said. “Perhaps your strength will return enough so you can cast the charm yourself.”

  Farnel coughed and waved Jemidon to the door. The sorcerer grabbed a torch and teetered after with a shuffling step. Without speaking, they started on the path.

  After half an hour of stumbles and rest stops, they arrived at the wooden building that was illuminated by a ring of torchlight at the end of the trail. It was the largest structure on the island, larger even than Canthor’s stone keep. Weathered cedar covered the exterior, a quilt of planks running in different directions, as new extensions were hastily added to accommodate the increased entourage that the high prince brought with him each year. Originally a two-storey rectangle of modest size, the hall sprawled in an ungainly array of annexes, corridors, and lofts. Jemidon and Farnel entered through the low door cut in the rear and ascended the half-flight of stairs that led to the stage. Behind the first few rows, the seats were not arrayed in a regular pattern. Instead, they clumped in groups of twos and threes, some with tables and lounges close at hand. Between each group, threading back and forth across the upslope, ran a confusion of partitions that blocked the view of one group from another, while not obscuring the stage.

  “The Maze of Partitions,” Farnel croaked as he waved at the sprawl of paneling. “Getting to a seat from the entrance in the front of the hall is like one of those puzzles y
ou are always babbling about.”

  Jemidon ignored the master’s frustrations at the turn of events. He looked at the muted tapestries on the outer walls that absorbed even the echoes of midday to produce an unnatural silence. From a well at the foot of the stage, an almost painful light leaped up to hit the array of faceted mirrors overhead. Beams of white blankness reflected throughout the theater, into the recesses off the luxury boxes along the walls, and through the corridors to the more private suites branching in random directions. Besides the wellbeams, the hall glowed from a scatter of candles and oil lamps tucked into odd crannies, the ones closest to the tapestries above buckets of sand or water, in case they should catch fire. One stretch of paneling was streaked with smoky black from an apparent accident long ago. Others danced with frescoes and mosaics, pale reminders of popular glamours cast over the years.

  Except for the masters sitting in the first row, the auditorium was empty. But Jemidon found himself imagining the scene on the night of the judging for the supreme accolade—what it might be like, once he wore the robe of the master…

  In his mind, a buzzing chatter filled the air, despite the heavy wall hangings. From unseen alcoves, coy giggles danced above the general drone. Silks and satins paraded through the maze, and rare perfumes mingled with the heat-laden air produced by the smoking torches. Smoothfaced pages glided between the boxes, offering sweetmeats and wine, stoically ignoring the teasing caresses of the noble ladies.

  When his face finally appeared in the multifaceted mirror, the voices abruptly stopped in all the small cubicles. Perhaps from backstage, the lilt of a simple melody radiated into the hall, deliberately soft so that everyone strained to hear. In synchronism with the rising curtain, he began his glamour, a roll of warm words that gently compelled and embellished the dimly lighted shadows on the stage. The reflections of his eyes permeated everywhere, seemingly attentive to each individual who was there.