Night of Madness

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  "I can lift myself off the ground," said the woman who had mentioned theurgists, "but I can't really fly so much as float."

  Faran looked at her, then said, "What's your name?"

  "Alladia of Shiphaven."

  "Alladia. Thank you. For now, just stand near the table."

  She obeyed.

  Sheila also went to stand by the table, and Hanner accompanied her. He found himself standing next to Alladia.

  "I'm Lord Hanner," he said. "I'm pleased to meet you."

  "I could wish it were under other circumstances," Alladia said, looking around as the others sorted themselves out.

  "You'd rather not be a warlock?" Hanner asked.

  "That's right," Alladia said.

  This was interesting; Hanner wondered whether he could gain any insight into Alris or the others. "Is it just because of the overlord's threats?" he asked. "Suppose no one knew-wouldn't you like it then?"

  Alladia turned to look him in the eye. "No, I wouldn't," she said.

  "Why not? After all, you have magic now, without even serving an apprenticeship."

  "I had magic before" Alladia replied angrily. "I was a priestess!"

  "A theurgist?" Understanding dawned. Warlockry interfered with witchcraft and wizardry; presumably it interfered with theurgy, as well.

  "That's right. And a good one, if I do say so myself. But ever since this thing got inside my head, the gods won't listen to me. The simplest invocation goes unanswered. I tried to consult Unniel to find out what was wrong, and even she ignores my prayers!"

  "Unniel?" The name was vaguely familiar.

  "Unniel the Discerning. She's one of the easiest of all the gods to contact; any halfway competent apprentice can speak to Unniel. But since the night before last, I can't! In the past I've successfully summoned Asham and Govet, and now I can't even call Unniel!"

  "And you think it's because you're a warlock?"

  "Of course. What else could it be? Something's put this curse on us, and it's cut me off from the gods. Before I could open gateways to another world, heal the sick, reveal any secret; now I can send plates flying about the room. Do you consider that a good exchange?"

  "No," Hanner admitted.

  Before he could say any more, Faran called for attention.

  "I count ten who can't fly, thirteen who can, eleven who don't know," he announced. "Let's see if we can sort out those eleven. Hanner, if you would step aside?"

  Hanner glanced at Sheila and Alladia, but then stepped away from the table.

  "In fact, Hanner," Faran said, "if you don't mind, would you wait in the parlor with Alris and Mavi? And if Manrin and Ulpen come back down, send them in."

  "You only want warlocks in here," Hanner said.

  "That's right. No need to crowd things any more than necessary."

  Hanner hesitated. This was a moment when he could admit that he was a warlock after all-and he really should admit it, shouldn't he? Sooner or later the truth would come out.

  But if it did, he would be either exiled or put to death, or would find himself caught in Uncle Faran's schemes permanently, and he would never get back to his own bed, his own rooms, in the Palace.

  He bowed, patted Sheila reassuringly on the shoulder, and left the room, closing the door behind him.

  In the parlor, Alris asked, "What are they doing in there?"

  "Sorting warlocks," Hanner replied. "Seeing who can do what."

  Mavi shuddered. Hanner looked at her, startled.

  "Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "I know they're just people, that they didn't ask for this spell or power or whatever it is, but they make me nervous. Even your uncle, and poor Pancha. It's just so ..." She turned up her palms, unable to find the right word.

  And here was another reason not to admit he was a warlock, Hanner thought. He did not want to make Mavi nervous, nor did he want her to find him repulsive.

  He hadn't realized she felt this way.

  "The theurgist said Pancha wasn't even human anymore," Mavi said.

  "Alladia said that?"

  Mavi blinked at him. "No-who's Alladia?"

  "The theurgist turned warlock in there," Hanner said, pointing at the dining-hall door. "Who did you. mean?"

  "The theurgist who tried to cure Pancha this morning," Mavi explained. "He said the goddess he summoned didn't even think Pancha was still human!"

  That, Hanner thought, would indeed be a reason to find warlocks unpleasant to be around. He wondered why the goddess had thought so, and whether that was why Alladia couldn't summon Unniel. The pact made at the end of the Great War said only humans could invoke the gods.

  "And the dreams," Mavi continued. "Why do they have those dreams? Do they mean something?"

  "They don't all have the dreams," Hanner said.

  "But most of them did. And they sound so terrible-falling and burning and being buried alive. It's just... I don't know, excessive."

  "I suppose it is," Hanner agreed, glancing at the closed door.

  There was a sudden loud thump from the other room; Mavi started. Hanner glanced at the closed door of the dining hall, but otherwise didn't move.

  What he wanted to do was reach out with his will and open the door, to see what was happening-but he refused to use his magic.

  If it was his at all. No one knew what had caused the Night of Madness; all this warlockry might just be something some mad wizard had done.

  "Do you think it's permanent?" Mavi asked.

  Startled, Hanner turned back to her. "Do I think what's permanent?"

  "This warlockry. Maybe it's just temporary."

  "That would certainly simplify matters," Hanner said.

  "I stayed around today, hoping it would all just stop," Mavi said, staring at the closed door. "I wanted to be here, to help when it ended-I thought some of them would be upset. And I thought I could take Pancha home. But it isn't stopping."

  "No, it isn't," Hanner agreed. "At least, not yet."

  But it could, at any time. They couldn't know. That was the thing about magic-it didn't have to make sense. Sometimes it did make sense, and it was predictable enough that magicians could use it, and the whole city could rely on it, but sometimes it was just bizarre. A wizard could make a living creature out of powdered bone and feathers, or put a man to sleep with a pinch of dust and a single word-where was the logic in that? More than a hundred years ago a simple fire-lighting spell went wrong in the Small Kingdoms, and the resulting tower of flame was reportedly still burning, without fuel-how could it be? Why would virgin's tears work in certain spells, when the same woman's tears shed after her wedding night would be as useless as well water?

  Wizardry was the strangest, but where was the logic in sorcery, where certain devices would perform their functions flawlessly for centuries, and then simply stop? And other devices that appeared perfectly identical didn't work at all, or did something different.

  Or theurgy-why did the gods only grant certain requests? Why would they listen to some people and not others? Why did demons sometimes answer theurgical invocations?

  Magic was not far from madness-and in the case of warlockry, the distinction had initially been invisible. The warlocks who went rampaging through the city that first night had certainly appeared mad.

  So how could they know what warlockry would do? Uncle Faran was in there, trying to make sense of it-but what if there was no sense to be made? What if it were to simply vanish again, as abruptly as it had appeared? What if it changed form? What if there were another Night of Madness, but affecting an entirely different assortment of people?

  But then, all of life was like that, really. Even when Hanner had been sleeping in his own bed in the Palace, as safe as anyone could be, at any moment some mad magician's spell could have turned him to stone, or transformed him into a cat, or simply killed him.

  Even without magic, his own heart could just stop, or he could catch a fever, as his mother had, and be dead in a sixnight.

  One just had to make the bes
t of the situation, forge ahead as best one could, try to learn how things worked, and accept it when the rules changed and learn the new rules.

  Warlockry wasn't any different. It could vanish at any time, but while it was here, it would be useful to know how it worked and what it could do.

  He should be in there with Uncle Faran, studying the situation, he thought-but then he looked at Mavi's eyes, dark brown and shining.

  Uncle Faran had chased him out, and now Uncle Faran would have to do without him for a while.

  "Would you like me to walk you home?" he asked. "Get away from the warlocks?"

  She smiled. "I'd like that very much," she said.

  Alris made a gagging noise. "You two," she said. "What if I came along? That would ruin all your fun, wouldn't it?"

  "No, of course not!" Mavi said, turning and reaching out a welcoming arm. "We'd be happy to have you join us."

  Hanner didn't say anything at first; he was too busy struggling not to glare at his sister.

  Alris looked at him.

  "We'd be glad of your company," Hanner managed at last.

  She snorted. "No, you wouldn't. And I don't want to walk all the way to Newmarket, anyway, and someone should be here in case more warlocks show up, or Uncle Faran wants to know where you've gone, or those wizards come back down here looking for help."

  "I'm sure Bern's around somewhere," Hanner said.

  "No, you go ahead," Alris said with a wave. "I'll stay here."

  "As you please." Hanner turned to Mavi. "Shall we?"

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  As Hanner and Mavi stepped out the door into the streets of Ethshar a score of wizards were gathered around a table, discussing the situation, in a place that was not part of Ethshar, nor even of the World.

  "We still have no idea what caused it," a white-haired wizard said. "I have had a dozen of my best people working every divination we can find for the past two days, approaching the question from every angle we can think of, and we haven't learned a thing about its origins. That magical aura around the Source blocks everything."

  "We have consulted the dead, and with the aid of several theurgists we have consulted the gods," a cadaverous figure with a shaven skull said. "They know nothing of it."

  "I've spoken with Irith the Flyer, and of course with Valder," a beautiful woman who appeared to be only in her twenties said. "They don't remember anything that might help. If anyone knows of any other immortals who aren't wizards, please tell me. And I've sent a message to Fendel the Great, but as yet he hasn't replied."

  "We have some thirty warlocks aiding us in our experiments," another wizard reported. "Most volunteered; a few are prisoners taken on the Night of Madness who were, at our request, sentenced to serve us. So far, while we are learning a great deal about how warlockry operates, we don't have any idea what it is, where it came from, or whether it will remain as it is, go away, or change into something else."

  The litany continued-although they had learned a great deal about the events surrounding its appearance, nothing the wizards had tried had revealed anything important about the nature of warlockry itself.

  "I've gone through the histories and the forbidden lore. Nothing like this is recorded anywhere."

  "We spoke with half a dozen demonologists, and questioned a few demons ourselves, but learned nothing."

  "We have charted the paths of some two hundred of those who were summoned on the Night of Madness, and have found no subtle deviations, no hidden patterns-they all simply headed toward the Source by the most direct routes available to them."

  "We have studied the histories of a randomly chosen sample of known warlocks and have found no links, nothing to indicate why these people were chosen while others were not. We have noticed that there is a slight tendency for a family with a warlock in it to have more than one-that is, a warlock's cousin or sibling is more likely to be a warlock than the average person is-but what trait in the blood might explain this we cannot determine. We have also found that magicians of every sort were afflicted."

  "Wizards, too?" someone asked.

  "Wizards, too," the speaker replied. "We are currently attempting to divine exactly who in the Guild has become a warlock."

  "None of us, surely?"

  "That remains to be determined."

  That created a stir, and for a moment the formal recitation was interrupted. Finally a red-robed figure at the head of the table rose to his feet and spoke.

  "While we must continue our investigations," he said, "I think it would be expedient to also begin to take action in certain cases where it is clearly appropriate."

  "Lord Azrad would certainly like us to do something," Ithinia of the Isle said, from her seat near the far end of the table. "He expected me to attend him yesterday."

  "Lord Azrad presumes too much," the red-robed wizard said. "We are not ready to enforce his sentences of exile or join in any campaign of annihilation, nor do we have time to waste in listening to his complaints. However, by our own rules, we are bound to restrain forbidden uses of magic. We have not yet established whether warlockry itself is forbidden by any of our covenants, but there have certainly been uses of it, and instances of its presence, that violate Guild laws. It is time we began to deal with these on a case-by-case basis." He took a deep breath, then continued, "For one thing, it may be educational to see whether we can deal with them-it may be that warlocks are more formidable than we think." He pointed at one of the others. "You, Kaligir-choose a warlock who is unquestionably guilty of serious crimes and send someone to deal with him. Let us see just what happens when wizard and warlock meet in combat."

  "Any warlock?" Kaligir asked.

  "Use your judgment, man."

  "Rather, use a divination," the white-haired wizard suggested.

  "An excellent suggestion," the red-robed wizard agreed.

  "Very well," Kaligir said, slumping in his chair.

  "And, Kaligir," the man in red said, "I expect a report-remember, a part of your task is to discover just how great a threat to us these warlocks truly are."

  "As you say," Kaligir replied. He straightened, then stood. "I had best get on with it, then."

  "As had we all," the red-robed wizard said. "I will remain here to coordinate, but the rest of you, begone, and press onward your researches!"

  Robes rustled, chairs creaked, and the wizards arose and scattered.

  Shemder Parl's son watched his intended victim with an unpleasant smile. Kirris was going about her business, hanging her laundry out on the line in the courtyard behind the house she shared with her husband and two young children, blithely unaware of her old suitor's presence on a nearby rooftop.

  Shemder debated just what he would do to her. Perhaps a roofing tile could fall and break her skull.

  It was a shame, he thought, that he had not had this wonderful magic a month ago, when she bore her second daughter; if he had caught her in childbirth he could have done something really slow and unpleasant without fear of detection.

  Perhaps a roofing tile might cause an injury that would not kill her instantly, and he could then find some way to ensure that she never recovered.

  But that was risky; her husband might hire a magician to treat her, and the magician might notice some invisible sign that war-lockry was involved. Shemder did not know just what traces war-lockry left, if any; he knew there were none visible to an ordinary person, but magicians could often see things others could not-as he could see things now that ordinary people could not.

  A shadow fell across his vision, blocking the light of the setting sun, and he looked up.

  As if summoned by his thoughts, a magician was standing in the air beside him, looking down at him-a man in blue robes. Shemder didn't know much about magic, but he guessed this must be a wizard-demonologists wore black or perhaps red, theurgists wore white or gold, sorcerers didn't wear robes, and he didn't think a witch could stand in midair so effortlessly.

  "You are Shemder Pad's son?" the m
agician asked.

  "No!" Shemder said. "My name's Kelder. Why? Who's this Shemder you're looking for?"

  The magician hesitated. Shemder did not; he reached out with his own magic and found the man's heart, beating steadily in his chest.

  It was harder than usual; something was in the way, some other sort of magic. Shemder did not let that stop him.

  A simple squeeze, and the magician gasped, eyes widening, arms flung wide; he toppled backward, tumbled down the sloping tile roof, and flopped over the eaves.

  A second later Shemder heard the dull crunch of the body landing in the alleyway below.

  He hesitated only a moment, wondering who the magician had been and who had sent him-had some friend or relative of one of the half-dozen people he had already killed hired a magical avenger?

  If so, whoever it was had chosen the wrong hired hero.

  Perhaps Kirris or her husband had made a contract for magical protection? They couldn't have known about Shemder's plans, but young parents sometimes did foolishly extravagant things out of worry about their infant children.

  Either way, this rooftop was no longer somewhere Shemder wanted to stay. Kirris was safe for now-though once he knew what was going on, and how to deal with it, Shemder intended to come back for her..

  Staying nearby after killing a wizard, though-Shemder wasn't fool enough to do that! He slid down the roof, on the far side from where the magician had fallen, and lowered himself over the edge. Then he caught himself in the air and settled slowly and gently to the ground, landing in the deserted street-though he knew he couldn't count on it staying deserted. Someone might happen along at any minute, hurrying home to supper, and Shemder did not want to be in the area when someone glanced in that alley and found a dead wizard. He turned, took a step toward the corner...

  And felt himself shrinking, twisting, his skin crawling as fur grew, a tail thrusting out behind him, his clothes vanishing and the warm air against his skin. The houses reared up hugely around him, towering over him.