by Paul Collins
‘Sit down,’ Elorsa said. ‘There is much to tell, but I fear we have little time.’
Her words proved prophetic for there was a knock at the rear door. Everybody froze. The knock came again. Then it was repeated in a distinct pattern. Alin opened the door and two men entered.
‘Pirin, Jod. Come in, quick.’ Alin peered outside before closing the door.
The newcomers looked at Daretor and Jelindel in evident dislike.
‘Well,’ grumbled Pirin. ‘You have roused the city, make no mistake of that.’
Osric and Zimak peered at the city that lay some ten thousand feet below. S’cressling remained at the same altitude and held a circling pattern. The land was totally unfamiliar, nor did they know how they would be greeted by the locals.
‘Why don’t we just land in the town square and ask?’ said Zimak, impatiently.
‘And what if they’re not the friendly sort?’ Osric demanded.
‘Why shouldn’t they be? Why is everybody so suspicious?’
‘There is treachery everywhere,’ muttered Osric. ‘Particularly in the hearts of women,’ he finished off.
‘They’re not all like Jelindel,’ Zimak said. I like a good wench.’
Osric nodded. After a while, he said, ‘S’cressling knows that Fa’red did not send Jelindel and Daretor to the Stone People. Where this place is I do not know but one thing is certain: Fa’red did not send them here for their good health.’
Zimak gazed glumly at the dimly lit city. It seemed somewhat smaller than D’loom. Judging by the lights, it wasn’t as densely populated either. He was sick of flying, sick of feeling queasy, sick of throwing up over the side of the deck platform. He wanted solid earth beneath his feet and he really didn’t care where it was.
‘Well, what are we going to do then?’
‘We? We’re not doing anything. I’ll ask S’cressling to put down on one of those towers as soon as everybody is asleep and you’re going to reconnoitre.’
‘Me? What about you?’
‘It was your idea to go down there and search for Daretor and Jelindel. Besides, somebody has to look after S’cressling.’
‘Seems to me she looks after herself.’
‘They’re our friends down there,’ Osric said flatly.
‘Gah, I wouldn’t exactly call them friends,’ Zimak snorted. ‘Especially that vixen Jelindel.’
‘She has betrayed you,’ stated Osric.
‘She’s cheated me out of powerful weapons, banished me to a paraworld, abducted me from a harem, robbed me of kinghood, seduced my best friend, and, and – do you want me to continue? I can.’
‘Then why do you seek her company?’ Osric asked. ‘Men are more loyal.’
‘Hie, Osric. Isn’t that the truth? But why do we do a lot of things?’ Zimak said. ‘Why did Daretor and I save you from the Temple Inviolate?’
‘Because without me you couldn’t escape on the back of a dragon.’
Zimak turned in the saddle and glared. ‘Of all the ungrateful wretches! Next time I won’t bother saving you or anyone else.’
‘Well next time is upon us, so make up your mind. In case it has slipped your attention, Rakeem’s poison must surely be working on your body by now.’
‘We’re as good as dead anyway,’ Zimak said. ‘If the poison doesn’t get us, Rakeem will.’
‘Finding the dragonsight is only a portion of your future,’ Osric predicted. ‘Play that part, and another may present itself.’
‘You’re sounding more like a market charm vendor every day,’ Zimak observed. ‘All right, I’ll do things your way.’
‘Good. After we land, you find Daretor and Jelindel then signal me.’
‘Signal you? How?’
‘Improvise. Light a fire.’
‘Hie, easy, as long as there’s a tinder box lying around, along with a pile of hay and faggots stacked for me to light.’
‘Ever the pessimist,’ said Osric, shaking his head. ‘Maybe Jelindel still has the whistle I gave her.’
At a command from Osric, S’cressling banked steeply and descended. Zimak held on tightly and cursed the day, several years ago, when he had left the D’loom markets in search of an enchanted mailshirt.
‘What were you thinking?’ demanded Pirin, pointing angrily at Alin and Elorsa. ‘You have endangered the entire movement.’
Alin was unapologetic. ‘It’s time something happened around here, Pirin. We skulk and hide, and we plot, but we never do anything. It’s only a matter of time before we’re betrayed, and without doing anything.’ At Pirin’s silence, Alin added, ‘Look how many of us are left. We’re dwindling like coins to the Provost’s coffers.’
‘Alin’s right,’ Elorsa added.
‘So you took matters into your own hands?’
‘This woman is a powerful sorceress,’ Alin said. ‘She might even be more powerful than the Provost himself.’
Pirin laughed. ‘If she’s so powerful why did she sit so meekly inside her cell, waiting to be rescued? Why didn’t she just blow the door open and walk out? Tell me that, Alin.’
Elorsa interrupted again. ‘Because she’s lost her memory.’
Pirin peered at Jelindel. ‘Well, isn’t that convenient. A sorceress who can’t remember magic. She’s as much use as a bow without an arrow.’
Daretor stepped between Pirin and Jelindel. ‘You know nothing of what you speak,’ he said. ‘There are few mages in Q’zar who can rival Jelindel dek Mediesar.’
Pirin’s companion, who had said nothing so far, cleared his throat. ‘Perhaps we should discuss this more sensibly.’
Pirin withdrew, but shot his colleague a dark look. The smaller man gazed back, asserting his authority.
The man invited everybody to sit around the table. When they had done so, he introduced himself. ‘I am Jod Ukin. By day I am a banker and merchant. By night I am as you see me now. A dis-reputable plotter and a traitor to my tyrant sovereign, the Provost Marshal of Ishluk.’ He leaned his elbows on the table and looked closely at Jelindel. ‘Are you truly a great mage, one of those we sometimes hear of when news reaches us from afar?’
Jelindel looked uneasy.
‘She is,’ Daretor said, taking her hand.
She looked into his eyes and silently mouthed, ‘I am?’
Jod Ukin regarded them, then looked at Alin and Elorsa. ‘She has demonstrated power?’
They both nodded vigorously. Jod Ukin thought for a long moment then stood up.
‘Let us begin then,’ he declared.
The others stood, not understanding. ‘Begin what?’ asked Pirin.
‘The revolution, of course.’
The word went out. At the sixth hour the next morning cadres of revolutionaries were to strike across the city, taking over key locations. Old men and women who could remember the days before the current regime, and who had once practised magic, were to assemble at strategic places. Jod Ukin doubted they could muster any magic greater than a few weak curses, but every bit would help.
Daretor felt as if he had been caught up in a whirlwind. He was also none too sure that Jelindel would be of much help. He sat with her for some time, relating her own history. While she seemed to remember bits and pieces, it was fragmentary. Her responses to most of the stories was a gasp of amazement and something along the lines of ‘I did that?’
For her part, Jelindel felt like she was listening to somebody else’s life story, one that was fascinating, but in no way hers.
That night they got what sleep they could, but by the fourth hour everyone was gathered and ready. Daretor and Jelindel had agreed to accompany Alin, Elorsa and Jod Ukin to the Provost’s palace. The Provost was, by all accounts, a powerful sorcerer in his own right, and would prove a formidable enemy.
Ten minutes before the sixth hour they were in position. Overhead, the sky was lit by the gibbous Blanchmoon, and piercingly bright stars. On street level, silent forces crept.
‘Not exactly what we bargained for,’ said Daret
or, close to Jelindel’s ear. She simply nodded. Daretor had written out as many spells and charms as he could remember, and Jelindel was memorising them. Binding spells and blinding spells would be useful, as well as shield spells that would repel projectiles. There was also a spell that made enemies move in slow motion, making them satisfyingly vulnerable.
Jelindel had grave doubts about her ability to work magic of any kind, let alone useful magic. Jod had placed her with his ‘magic’ contingent. Their job was solely to counter any spells emitting from the Provost’s priest-guards. Jod would take on the Provost. Jelindel looked around. She saw only elderly, frightened men and women. Some even clutched reminder notes, in case they forgot their spells.
Jelindel’s heart lurched. If these people had ever gained paraplane spirits, they had long since relinquished their hold over them. Without spirit-power, their magic would be weak. Jelindel’s eyebrows knitted. How did she know that?
Jod appeared beside her. ‘It’s time,’ he told the elderly bunch. ‘Stay together if you can.’ That said he raced across the deserted marketplace. The others followed. Cane ladders were hoisted up against the boundary wall. Within moments dark-clothed men and women were scaling the ladders. Two garrotted priest-guards lay on their backs, their dead eyes wide with surprise.
Jod waited for his people to clamber over the parapets. He then dropped his hand and everyone climbed down to the palace grounds. A wolfhound yowled in the distance, but it didn’t slow the scurrying figures as they raced towards the imposing building fashioned from white marble.
Several wolfhounds, loping around the side of the palace, started barking, their hackles erect. Jod had given instructions that nobody was to use magic until the last possible moment. An elderly man took fright. Before he could complete a simple warding spell, several bolts struck the beasts. They tumbled in a whining heap, but they had roused the palace guard. Somewhere to the left swords clanged, then someone shrieked. Jod cursed beneath his breath. He had hoped to enter the palace before their presence was discovered.
He readied himself as priest-guards rushed them. Daretor vaulted an ornamental pond and engaged three of them. His sword flashed and whirled. A priest-guard dropped as the blade cut across his face, another clutched his abdomen and went down. The third dropped his sword and raised his hands, then babbled an incantation.
Daretor buckled over as something invisible thumped into him. The next moment he was flung through the air to land twenty yards away. The wind knocked from him, he saw several of the revolutionaries thrown in a similar fashion. Some crashed into stone walls and fell dead, others rolled on the ground.
Then Jod’s sorcerers struck. The promenade became criss-crossed with purple, pink and blue flickering bolts of light. Tightening the grip on his sword, Daretor steadied himself. The fighting was thickest by the main entrance to the palace. Shaking his head to clear it, he made for the colonnaded steps.
Jelindel stood back and chanted spells, aiming them with sweeping gestures of her hands. The strange part of it was that they mostly worked. Blue light flickered out and wrapped itself around its victims, toppling and binding them. She felt giddy with this newfound power. But she became slightly dazed, as though drained. She saw Daretor being thrown across the courtyard, and immediately she cast a binding spell at the throat of his attacker. The priest-guard had not warded himself, no doubt unaware of the power in their attackers. His body twitched in seizure; he clutched at his throat as though he were being strangled, then collapsed. Jelindel walked towards the palace as though mesmerised, almost oblivious to the mayhem.
Daretor took the steps three at a time, once almost tripping over a body. He dispatched the only priest-guard left at the entrance, then entered the grand and richly appointed atrium. Here the fighting had reached fever-pitch. The Provost’s elite guards threw themselves into the frantic, desperate fight, seemingly unafraid of death. They were disturbingly like Fa’red’s deadmoon assassins.
Outside, dawn spread reddish sunlight that spilled through the atrium windows, revealing the carnage. It also revealed a squad of elite guards who had been rushed from the barracks.
Jelindel’s mind cleared, and she tried a spell she had not yet used. The slow-motion spell ensnared the advancing guards, instantly slowing their movements. Against even the ill-trained rebels, they were easy prey. Demoralised, some of the defenders broke ranks and fled. Messengers arrived to report to Jod that the city had been taken, more or less. Jod nodded acknowledgement, but he was aware that their revolt was far from over. The Provost had not shown himself yet.
No sooner had he thought that, than a cry went up. All eyes turned towards a huge archway on the north side. Standing there, dwarfed by the arch, yet somehow filling it with his powerful aura, stood Kagan, the Provost Marshal.
The attackers ceased fighting. The Provost took a step forward and the front ranks crumpled silently to the ground. Those left standing seemed to be the immediate targets of crossbowmen who had appeared from the mansion’s numerous balconies. Jod’s people retaliated with a withering flight of arrows, but they seemed too few and too late to save those under attack.
The Provost waved his hand and half of the second rank went down as though felled by a giant invisible scythe.
Jod Ukin took a deep breath and shouted the spell, ‘Velectumbassius-sui!’
The ground rumbled. Even Jod’s people fled the lawn that was now undulating as though an earthquake was gathering momentum. Then something sprang from the ground like water from a fountain. It coalesced into a shimmering body of white light, and then solidified.
‘Slissum-vec-takine!’ Jod incanted, before sagging to the ground. His lifeforce was being drained to sustain the ethereal manifestation.
Jelindel shielded her eyes from the blinding apparition. She had to do something, but what? Jod had put everything into one spell. Somehow she knew this was foolhardy. If the paraplane creature failed him, he would be completely defenceless against the Provost.
The being hovered in indecision. Jelindel took a deep breath. She then focused her mind on the creature, willing it to move. The thing pulsed on the lawn for a moment longer, then skimmed the surface of the grass and reached out for the Provost.
The body of light sought to devour the Provost, but as its outer aura closed in around him, it seemed to diminish. Within seconds it was flowing into the outline of the Provost as though he had inscribed a paraplane black hole around his body, and it was drinking in the light. Moments later, the ruptured lawn was all that remained of Jod’s trump spell. Jelindel walked forward, leaving Jod’s crumpled body behind.
Kagan gazed at her in genuine puzzlement. ‘You? You’re this rabble’s secret weapon?’ he said, mistaking her for the creator of the white apparition. ‘You will rue the day you took up with this lot,’ he concluded.
He waved his hand in a dismissive manner. A tongue of red light jagged across the lawn and struck Jelindel. She was lifted bodily and thrown against a column. She slammed against it and fell forward. A low moan swept the ranks of the attackers. Jod Ukin forced his eyes open and saw the triumphant Kagan. The Provost would kill them all.
‘So we have all the rats in the one basket, do we?’ said Kagan. His lips moved and a deadly red light gathered about him. It began to swirl, spinning faster and faster like a tiny tornado. Suddenly it bellied out towards the remnants of Jod’s rebels. They scattered, but all fell under the might of the whirlwind. The wind increased, throwing them across the grounds.
‘You want to see magic?’ Kagan bellowed above the shrill whirlwind. ‘Then I shall give you magic.’ He raised his arm to cast the deadly vortex. It would cut them down like a storm in a field of corn.
Instead the red vortex imploded, quickly dissipating. The Provost stared about him, stunned. ‘What?’ he gasped. ‘Who dares defy me?’
‘Me,’ said a voice. All fighting ceased. Both sides turned and stared at Jelindel, whose outflung hand was still directed at Kagan. Leaning heavily against the
palace wall, she was bleeding from a scalp wound. A moment later she let her right arm fall to her side.
Kagan muttered a word and raised both hands, creating a ball of writhing light between them. His face contorted in fury as he flung it at her. It singed the very air as it passed over the heads of the combatants. The power in it was felt hundreds of yards away. People ducked as the white light passed. None doubted that it would annihilate the wisp of a girl who was its intended victim, yet somehow that did not happen.
Jelindel raised her left hand, palm out, and chanted a ward spell. The ball of sizzling energy hovered in midair. She then clenched her hand and flicked her fingers out. The ball hurtled back at Kagan. His face had barely enough time to display absolute terror before the white light engulfed him.
The people on the lawn shrank back from the spectacle, mostly shielding their eyes against the blinding light. Those who dared look saw Kagan’s body limned by the devouring light, before the flesh was shredded from its bones. Moments later, the Provost’s skeleton fell apart and collapsed.
Jelindel could not comprehend her success. It had seemed to her that Kagan would easily dissolve his own creation and retaliate with such speed that she would be unable to block his counter spell. But at the precise moment she warded off the paraplane entity, the Provost had been distracted by something on the palace roofline.
People were moaning in fear, others dropped their weapons as though they were redundant. Then Jelindel heard, rather than saw, someone running towards her. It was a hooded figure. A man with his hand gripping a long-bladed knife.
‘Jelindel,’ Daretor cried. Jelindel was already turning, but too slowly. She was groggy from the magical battle, and actually stumbled as she turned, starting to fall.
The knife fell from the man’s fingers as he gripped Jelindel’s arm, stopping her fall. At the same time the cowl fell back from his face. Daretor rushed beside him and looked on, dumbstruck.
