Key to Magic 02 Magician

by H. Jonas Rhynedahll

“You weren’t looking at the stone, boy,” Medj chided.

  “Well, that’s what Yrivol said it said.”

  “Read it to me, just the words. Exactly, mind.”

  Streb huffed. Far too quickly to avoid, Mother’s Grandfather whacked him with the end of his staff.

  “Ow!”

  “Don’t try my patience, boy. I don’t have any.”

  Rubbing the stinging spot on his shoulder, Streb turned and peered at the stone.

  “Uhm . . . Be warned . . . uhm . . . one who is not dead . . . and who . . . is not . . . uhm . . . alive . . . uh, uhm . . . rests? . . . here.”

  “Is that all?”

  “There’s one more line, Mother’s Grandfather. Uhm . . .He saved his family but . . . con---con-uh hmmm –“

  “Condemned.”

  “Aye, condemned . . .his people and himself.”

  Medj grunted and leaned on his staff.

  “Well,” Streb prompted, “are we going in?”

  “In?”

  “Yrivol says there’s stairs!” Streb bounded onto another slab of rock and pointed up the hill.

  “Show me these stairs.”

  At the highest point of the hill rested an artificial mound about the size of a fishing boat hull turned upside down. A stiff breeze with the scent of the sea rose over the cliffs at the edge of the promontory, flattening the thick grass and whistling through the brambles that covered the mound. Streb led Medj to its north end, winding among boulders and the few gnarled trees to reach a pitch-black opening faced with crudely chipped stone. Cracked slate steps overgrown with moss led downward.

  “Might be snakes down there. Wish we had a lamp,” Medj muttered.

  “I’ve got one!” Streb exclaimed. He dropped his pack to the ground and began rummaging around inside. After a moment, he found a small fish-oil lamp and a striker. Lighting the lamp, which offered only a feeble glow at best, he presented it proudly to Mother’s Grandfather.

  A slow, gasping groan echoed out from the dark opening and then faded to nothing, as if whatever trapped soul uttered the sound had expended the last of its strength.

  “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea,” Medj suggested tentatively, taking a step back.

  “Oh, it can’t hurt us, Mother’s Grandfather!” Streb complained. “The stone said it’s mostly dead!”

  “That’s not exactly what it said, boy.”

  Streb’s shoulders slumped. “Mother’s Grandfather! You promised –“

  “I did no such thing, boy. I’m not senile yet and I know exactly what I say and don’t say. You tend to hear what you want to hear.”

  Medj was silent for a moment, surveying the disappointment evident on Streb’s face. “But it’d be a shame to have come this far --”

  Seizing on this as permission, Streb scampered down the slate steps before Medj could change his mind, cupping his palm to protect the lamp’s sputtering flame. He heard Mother’s Grandfather sigh loudly behind him and follow, grumbling.

  The stairway dropped steeply, many of the narrow steps broken and difficult to manage, then leveled out into a slime-floored passage barely wide and tall enough to walk in. Scum covered the ill-fitted stones that lined it, hanging down in malodorous strings where water leaked through in the rainy season.

  Mother’s Grandfather’s hand fell heavily on his shoulder. “Go slowly and mind you watch for snakes.”

  “Aye, Mother’s Grandfather.”

  Medj twisted his hand spryly and nipped Streb’s ear.

  “OW!”

  “Call me Medj, boy.”

  Streb cupped his ear to protect it from further assault. “Aye, Mother’s —-- Medj.”

  The passage made a sharp left, then doubled back upon itself to the right. Two paces further it turned left again and Streb’s light revealed a vaulted, square chamber only three paces on a side. In the center of a chamber stood a low stone bier and on the bier, a gray shape.

  Medj shouldered Streb aside and peered within. After a moment, he laughed. “Why, it’s only an old tomb, boy, occupied by no demon but just a pathetic old bag of bones.”

  Streb stuck his head and his light around Mother’s Grandfather’s arm. “But the moaning, Mother’s Grandfather, it has to be a demon?”

  “Nay, like I said before, just the wind. See that beam of moonlight? When the wind hits that hole just right, I’d imagine it makes your demon moaning.”

  “Oh.” Streb felt his excitement and wonder draining away.

  Mother’s Grandfather advanced into the chamber. “Bring your light closer boy. Let’s see if the corpse has any valuables about him.”

  Streb gasped in disbelief. “You’re going to rob the dead, Mother’s Grandfather?”

  Medj wagged a hand at him dismissively.

  “It’s not robbing, boy. It’s salvaging. First Law of the Sea, learned it when I was about your age. Those that don’t have need of things no more should give them up to those that do. Now, bring the light.”

  Streb crept forward, not wanting anything to do with dead folk, and held the lamp at arm’s length toward Mother’s Grandfather.

  Medj bent over the bier, eyeing the skeletal figure. It sprawled face up with only dirt and sickly green mold for covering. “He’s been preserved, boy, like leather. See how his dried old skin is stretched over his bones? The wild people way south of Lhorvhavhen do that to their dead. Stick them up in tiny holes carved in the cliffs along the coastal desert. They last for years and years and their kin go and have chats with them.”

  Mother’s Grandfather chuckled at the memory then noticed that Streb did not appreciate the humor.

  “Did you catch that last part, boy? I said they go and have chats with their deceased relatives. Ask them about the weather and what not, I expect.”

  Streb found his hand, and consequently the lamp, shaking. “I haven’t never been around a dead person, Mother’s Grandfather.”

  Medj grunted depreciatingly. “You’ve nothing to fear, boy. One thing I do know -- as I’ve seen a great lot of them in my time – dead men are dead and are forever beyond helping or harming the living.”

  Streb was not convinced. Taking the lamp in both hands to steady it, he watched the ancient corpse carefully.

  Mother’s Grandfather shrugged and returned to his scrutiny. “Well, there’s nothing to be salvaged here. Not a ring or a bracelet one. If this poor fool ever had anything of worth, it’s been taken long ago.”

  “Mother’s Grandfather!”

  “Eh, what is it, boy?”

  “The hand! It’s moving!”

  “I told you I’m not yet senile, boy. You’ll have to learn to jest better than that if you want to make a fool out of me.”

  “But Medj, look!”

  Streb watched, paralyzed with fear as the corpse’s hand, slimed flesh barely holding the bones together, raised from the bier.

  A voice, dry as sand, pleaded in a strained whisper, “Help me. . .”

  Streb screamed, dropping the lamp. He was half way down the hill before Mother’s Grandfather caught up with him.

  As the old man passed him, his gangling legs churning with a speed that the boy had never before seen, he shouted over his shoulder, “Never tell anyone about this, boy!”

  Streb, sprinting for all he was worth, did not bother to reply. He was certain to never mention this night to another soul, for the demon had so frightened him that he had lost his bladder.

  In the tomb, miraculously, Streb’s lamp had landed upright and continued to burn.

  The corpse moved slightly, sensing the light. For half a decade, the moonlight that found the tiny hole above it perhaps three times a year had given it enough strength to attempt to call out, but little more. The wan yellow light from the lamp gave it a relatively huge burst of energy, and it wondered in a drifting, unfocused fashion if it had ever felt such energy before. After a number of attempts, it rolled from the bier into the muck and began dragging itself toward the lamp. Unable to raise its head, it left a f
urrow through the muck and a thin smear of pale blood on the packed gravel of the floor. When it finally reached the lamp, it huddled close to it, absorbing.

  Some hours later, it crawled, with nerves experiencing the newly revived sensation of pain, out of the tomb into the blinding light of dawn. Eyes open and staring, for the first time in thousands of years, it simply basked in the sun.

  THREE

  The Greatest City in All the World

  1644 After the Founding of the Empire

  “You are of Khalar?”

  Mar nodded, his mouth full, wondering what particular characteristic of his had suggested his origin to the prince. Khalarii and Mhajhkaeirii were the same people, more or less, with no ethnic distinctions that he knew of. There were some mannerisms of speech that were different, but nothing that he would not have been able to pick up with a little study. Were there no war, he felt certain that he could have, as he had planned, blended into the city populace and gone utterly unnoticed.

  He would have to be constantly on guard around this perceptive Mhajhkaeirii prince.

  Ulor had brought him a plate heaped with cold beans, two thick slices of dark bread, and a bowl of some heavily salted yellow vegetable mixed with chunks of baked fish. The bread was good, evidently baked that same day; the rest was filling. The Mhajhkaeirii had also produced a half bottle of wine, but he had asked for cool water instead. Having spent most of his life without the coin for it, wine was seldom to his taste.

  The Mhajhkaeirii had not taken him from the court where he had brought the house to rest, but rather had made a small table and stool to be brought to him. All the Mhajhkaeirii -- particularly Lord Ghorn -- radiated a tightly restrained sense of urgency that Mar could well understand. The wounded marines had been whisked away, but Mhiskva and about a dozen who were still fit enough to fight, including the omnipresent Berhl and his compatriot Ulor, remained close. Both of these last hovered near Mar like anxious hens.

  Lord Ghorn also remained, seated on another stool on the opposite side of the table. Mar was unfamiliar with the military ranks of the Mhajhkaeirii. “Prince-Commander of the Defense” sounded significant, but then some of the ranks used in Khalar had sophisticated titles but the positions themselves held no substance. The prince might simply be some type of bureaucrat, but likely he was of the patriarch class, though Mar did know that the Mhajhkaeirii did not use that term. Lord Ghorn’s armor was practical rather than ostentatious and this led Mar to believe that his authority was genuine. The other Mhajhkaeirii -- including Captain Mhiskva, Mar noted carefully -- certainly treated him with solid respect.

  The Mhajhkaeirii commander also radiated an undeniable confidence of command; this man was accustomed to obedience. He gave orders without hesitation and gave no consideration to the possibility that these commands would fail to be obeyed.

  In physical appearance, the prince seemed moderately unimpressive. With hair grayed at the temples and deep wrinkles at the edges of his dark eyes, he was of middle years, give or take half a decade,. He had strong shoulders and arms, and the sword that hung at his belt looked well used. Though he wore clean trousers under the skirt of his hauberk, it was clear that he had been wounded in one leg at some point in the day’s battles and could not stand unsupported for any length of time. Mar suspected that the Prince-Commander was in constant pain, but he concealed it extremely well.

  One of the men who had helped pull the marines from the house, it had developed, was a prisoner. He was nearly naked and raggedly tired but two large legionnaires watched him carefully by. Mar had wondered if the man were a Phaelle’n monk, but had decided that the ambivalent attitudes of the Mhajhkaeirii suggested that he was not.

  “I have not heard previously that magery was practiced in Khalar,” the Mhajhkaeirii prince prompted.

  Mar laughed around a mouthful of food, then paused for a swallow of water. “As far as I know, it isn’t.”

  The prince did not respond and gave the appearance of waiting for Mar to continue.

  Mar considered his situation. Though he felt captive, the Mhajhkaeirii were not overtly hostile and had not actually treated him ill. This Lord Ghorn, though evidently a hard man, gave every indication of being fair and honest, and was either an extremely proficient actor or exactly what he appeared. While Mhiskva had been doggedly insistent in a more or less friendly fashion that he meet with the prince, Mar could not say truthfully that he felt truly threatened by the giant. Their gratitude for his attacks on the common enemy -- which had turned the tide of the battle, if only for now – seemed entirely genuine. It was possible that a short-term alliance with the Mhajhkaeirii could generate benefits for him, if only in the rations and supplies of which he was in sore need. It would be near impossible, after all, to leave the city without food and vastly easier to proceed on his journey with proper clothing and gear. A semblance of cooperation seemed called for.

  “No magic is done openly in Khalar,” Mar said, choosing his words carefully. “There, it’s commonly considered only a myth, just children’s stories. I began my studies in the Waste.”

  All this was literally true, if purposefully misleading. Regardless of the extent of the gratitude of the Mhajhkaeirii, he felt it necessary to conceal as many of the facts as he could.

  Lord Ghorn leaned forward slightly. “Studies?” he questioned intently, then followed rapidly with increasing intensity, “Is there a magery school of some sort in the Great Waste? Are there other students? Certainly masters?”

  Mar shook his head, watching Lord Ghorn’s face and finding a swiftly concealed disappointment. He took a bite of bread to give him a moment to fabricate his answer.

  “I am – or was – a scrapper’s apprentice,” he said. “We discovered a fragment of an ancient book, a text of study in magic. From this I learned the few things that I know.”

  “This little that you know has turned back the best that the Monks could field,” the prince countered eagerly. “Where is this book now?”

  “I don’t know. My master kept it and he was taken by the Phaelle’n.”

  Again a vagrant hint of disappointment from the prince.

  “And thus you fight them.”

  Mar nodded, gathering the last spoonful of beans. Lord Ghorn fell silent, clearly deep in thought.

  “Do you think you could teach what you have learned of magery to others?” he asked at last.

  Rather than answer this question, to which he did not know the answer, Mar decided to interpose a question of his own. “Have you no magicians in your city?”

  He had actually wondered about this. It seemed likely that there would be people in The Greatest City in All the World who knew something of magic, perhaps masquerading as healers, as old Marihe had done.

  Lord Ghorn shared a look with Mhiskva and some message passed unsaid between them.

  “No, we do not,” the prince replied frankly. “Magery was unknown to us – just a myth, as you said, something you heard in fanciful stories from far off places – until we learned of its use from reports of the efforts of the Monks. Today is the first time that I myself -- any of us -- have witnessed its use and truly come to believe in its existence.”

  “And the first time you needed magicians,” Mar added. He could understand that easily enough; it seemed a duplicate of his own experience.

  Lord Ghorn inclined his head.

  “Which is why you sent Mhiskva for me.”

  “Yes.”

  “You can’t coerce me to aid you.”

  “This was never our intention.”

  Mar looked pointedly at Berhl.

  “For your protection, only, my lord magician,” Mhiskva injected with a smile.

  “Aye,” the prince agreed. “We need your aid, but will not attempt to compel it. We do ask that you consider allying with us. You alone, regardless of the power of your magery, cannot hope to defeat the Monks. Though I can only admit that I do not understand completely what magery is, I can see that the Monks have a great many
sorcerers and magery devices. In addition, they are building an empire from conquered cities that will supply them with increasing numbers of legionnaires and ships. Did they not come close putting an end to you today? I am not sure whether the legions of the Principate can defeat them, even with your magery, but I am convinced that we have very little chance without it.”

  “From my vantage point,” Mar told the prince, waving toward the sky, “You’re already beaten. You’ve lost most of the city and your great Citadel is breached. How will you drive back the Brotherhood when all they need do is stand back and flatten your entire city with those ships in the harbor? It’s a wonder to me that they’ve not already done so.”

  Lord Ghorn smiled viscously. “Their ships will not flatten anything if they are at the bottom of the bay.”

  “And how will you manage to sink them?”

  “Anything that floats can be sunk.”

  “Aren’t all your own ships destroyed?”

  “Not all. We have warships in other ports, and the Sister Cities of the Principate Council have fleets, but I was thinking of a type of attack that they may not be able to defend against.”

  “My sky raft.”

  “The Lord Magician has already suggested that he could sink the Phaelle’n ships,” Mhiskva offered helpfully. This struck Mar, reason and logic notwithstanding, as somewhat disloyal.

  “Indeed,” Lord Ghorn continued enthusiastically, “Such an attack –“

  Mar shook his head with steady determination. “No.”

  Lord Ghorn sat back, abruptly changing course. “Commander Aerlon.”

  The prisoner walked calmly to the table, his guards following. The man bowed slightly, his dignity giving him a presence beyond that of his meager appearance.

  The prince turned to the captive legion commander. “Will you speak freely?”

  Mar watched as the man examined him boldly. The prisoner’s face was set with parade ground precision but it was clear that he was trying to resolve some inner conflict. Finally, the man turned back to Lord Ghorn and, to Mar’s surprise, braced to attention and gave the archaic imperial salute used by the Mhajhkaeirii.