The Bard of Sorcery

by Gerard Houarner

  "You said your name was Tralane? I know you as Detrexan, a thief and a warrior. You came to this town two years ago, running from King Garice's guards. You told me of how you had left your mountain village and the old hag who took care of you there in your youth, and went north to the cities among the rivers to learn the tricks of thieving. Your skills, or lack of them, forced you to travel constantly or face a hangman's noose. When the Golden King's host passed through here, you joined, hoping to avenge yourself on King Garice's forces, and have been with Sagamourin ever since. The Detrexan I know has an unnatural love of pleasure that has gotten him in trouble more than once, the latest being an ill-timed return to the town that banished him for being caught sleeping with an important man's wife. Did you desert? You'll he caught, if not by my husband, then by your own comrades-at-arms. Couldn't you have waited for a better time?"

  The life he was supposed to have led did not strike Tralane as wholly improbable. He often fantasized himself in more daring and actively roguish adventures than those which he found himself undertaking in real life. But his hold on the past was firm—he knew where he had been and what he had done. He also knew the possibility existed of his having a twin on this new-found world. Yet the chance of his family line surviving so exactly in a world that differed in so many other ways made Tralane shiver. While vaguely parallel, this world was dissimilar enough in major facets to change the shape of humble lineages such as the one he assumed he had descended from. Even if his wildest dreams were true, and he was indeed some lost prince of the Karthasian Empire, he doubted he would be so lucky as to fall into a world in which his family had survived the vagaries of political life so exactly as to produce an identical twin.

  Was it chance that had led him out of Agathom's camp, or had an unknown power guided him into his present situation? Crecia had shown him how to invoke the amulet's magic, but not how to direct it. Tralane's confidence wavered before the realization that, indeed, the door to many worlds had been opened to him; but he was blind to the choices. The demons of his past pursued him while something led him helplessly into the unknown.

  "Detrexan?" Marzen probed.

  "No." He moved sluggishly out of his ruminations. "Tralane. I am different. I'm not the one you love. If you must know, if you can understand, I come from another Earth." He saw her draw back fearfully. "No, no, I'm not a demon. I've been … guided here, I think, though by whom, and why, I don't know. I don't understand." He grinned suddenly and gave her a wink. He put an arm around her waist and brought her closer to him. "I'm talking too much and taking my words too seriously. I can't be so different from your Detrexan in love, can I? Why don't we see—"

  She edged away from him, prying his hand from around her waist. "No, I'm not sure—I don't know." She stood, and Tralane felt a strong desire to touch her strong, lithe body. He struggled with a rush of emotion, thinking of her sad invulnerability to all the work and misfortunes which had hardened her body and mind, but not her heart. If he could touch her, offer her some kind of love and comfort, she would reward his sacrifice with the blessing of her strength. With Marzen by his side, choices would not matter. The loneliness would not be so overwhelming.

  "What about my husband and his friends?" she asked at last. "Do you think they'll believe you? I doubt you'll even have the chance to speak. It's a miracle nobody saw you when you came in. But my husband will be coming up sometime to see the old man, and then what will you do?"

  "Perhaps I'd best leave now," he said, reluctantly. His old plan of flight was not as attractive as it had once been.

  "No, my husband's asleep downstairs and the tavern is almost deserted. The few customers and servants moving about would spot you right away, even with a disguise. You'll have to wait until tomorrow evening, at the busiest hour, to try to get away. And pray you have the same good fortune you had tonight." She reached for the candle and started down the ladder.

  "Will you be back?"

  She glanced at him for a moment, not long enough for Tralane to understand the look on her face. "Just leave—and don't come here again."

  Tralane sat in the darkness, listening to Marzen descend. Only when she had left did he think to ask her to come with him. As he was about to go after her, he heard the trap door close, and then two voices talking. Crawling to the vertical passageway so he could hear better, he recognized Marzen speaking. She was shouting, protesting. He heard the words "honor" and "betrayal." A man answered, one whose voice he also recognized. He remembered, in particular, the powerful forearms and hands. Tralane returned to his sleeping mat. Perhaps Marzen's advice was for the best.

  A rustling against the far wall, followed by soft footfalls, told him Gibron was awake and heading towards him.

  "So I'm not the only one who can't sleep tonight," the bard exclaimed. The room's candle sprang into life. Gibron was drawing back his hand from the flame. Tralane sniffed at the scent of the simple magic. He had used such spells every day during his apprenticeship with Mathi, and just as effortlessly. He had not used them since.

  "I like to lie awake and think late at night, too, young one," Gibron said, sitting beside Tralane. "I heard your little conversation with Marzen and, though I may not smell as nice or feel as good to the touch as she, I believe I can be of more practical service to you."

  Tralane remained quiet, avoiding Gibron's eyes.

  "You've spoken of another world, yet you know the Sky Speech and dress and act like a mortal man. You have an aura about you that is not a wizard's nor a god's, but which tells me you've been nurtured in more than simple spells. These are mysteries which, perhaps, you might be able to explain?"

  "Why?" Tralane was prepared to say more, to expound on the old man's foolishness and bothersome curiosity, but he satisfied himself with the single, curt question. He did not want to give the wizard cause for sorcerous retribution.

  "Ah, no reason. None at all, for you. But you see, I believe you have come into the possession of a charm. No, not a mere charm, but a source, a point of focus for magic. You have power buried deep within you, but no skill in the arts to make it work. Yet you have something that sets you above the artless and apart from the practitioners of the art."

  Tralane rolled away from Gibron and stood. His head touched a beam, and he wished there were a window in the room so that he might look out into the night. He yearned to see the moons, the stars, the infinite space. He said nothing and allowed the wizard to continue.

  "We call such people Keepers, though they may be known by different names where you come from. Or do they know of such things in your world? No matter. No matter. I, with some few of the other mages, have long suspected that there are multiple consequences to each decision we make and that, at each fork in reality, a split occurs. Every decision creates a new world, a new dimension in which the consequences of a particular action are developed, and each new world splits further as new branches are opened up and alternate possibilities established. Can you imagine, Tralane, the number of earth-reflections that have been and are being created if, at every fork in every path of every living being, at least two new worlds were created—one for each alternative that we might have chosen? And you have the power to travel from one possible reality to another, do you not?"

  Gibron's words were translated into a vision of a leafless tree, its branches growing by the moment, splitting, entwining, filling the void of Eternity.

  Tralane, shaken by the vision, asked in a trembling voice, "Will you take it from me?" He was not sure if his question were not truly a plea.

  The mage laughed softly. "No, I would not. My hunger is not for such things, and I suspect I would be interfering with a scheme of existence which destined you to come into this power's possession. There is something that binds you to this charm you carry, so that two fates have been inextricably woven into one that has yet to choose a direction. I believe if I were to take it, my fate would soon be decided in favor of doom."

  "And what is my task as a Keeper?"

>   "Merely to live. You stand in the shadow of Life and Death, Order and Chaos. Stray too far from the shadows and you might well die. And your death would affect the Balance of all Being."

  Tralane stared up at the sloping ceiling. A huge weight seemed to bear down on the ceiling, making it close in on him. The fear that he could not decide the nature of his own actions and that some unknown force was leading him on took on greater substance. His hopes and ambitions seemed insignificant. He had worked a pretty theft, but had stolen more than he had bargained for.

  "You won't speak?" Gibron stood, stretched, and sat again facing Tralane. "Do not be dismayed. There are many Keepers and many fulcrums in the Balance of Being. Yours is not the only life to be so burdened. Now, tell me, how did you come upon this object?"

  In a rush of words scrambled into one long sentence, Tralane told Gibron about the coming of the Sorcerer King and how he had stolen the amulet that was Agathom's means of escape from a dying world. Without justifying himself, he told his listener about Oram and the companion in thievery he had left behind. The tale did not seem as bold as he had imagined it to be. Gibron was not Mathi, who had been only too willing to believe the fantastic over the real, so long as it allowed him to pursue his mysterious paths. In the solitary peace of the attic, Tralane's words rang hollow.

  Gibron retreated to his own place against the far wall and lay down on his sleeping mat. He closed his eyes and asked, "What drove you to steal this amulet?"

  Tralane shrugged uncertainly. "I had a desire for adventure. I wanted fortune, a kingdom. I had to escape. I don't know, really."

  "Neither do I," said Gibron, sighing. "I am certain you are the amulet's intended Keeper and that one of the Sorcerer King's functions was to deliver the Eye to you. But beyond that, I am at a loss. Perhaps there is more to this than the amulet. Perhaps Wyden's Eye is being used as a link between you and some manipulative power which is drawing you towards it. Why such a link would exist and to what purpose, I cannot even venture a guess."

  Gibron opened his eyes and looked at Tralane. "I am curious about this mystery. Will you let me travel with you? I can be of assistance and perhaps I can solve the riddle that surrounds you."

  "Yes, I'd like that," Tralane answered. He did not know what other course of action to take, and he needed someone to share the responsibility of having the Eye. "I need a guide."

  "Good. Tomorrow we'll make our plans. For now, I'm too weary for any more thinking and I suspect you also need rest, eh?"

  Tralane snuffed out the candle flame in response. He stretched out on his mat and began to doze almost at once. He thought he heard Gibron pose another question, concerning why he had not asked Marzen to join him in his travels. But the bard could no longer distinguish dream from reality. The demons rose to resume the chase, and he forgot all questions and answers.

  Chapter 6

  Tralane woke feeling refreshed and unburdened. He sat up, leaning on an elbow, and saw Gibron underneath the candle, in the position in which he had first met him.

  "Pleasant morning," Gibron greeted him.

  Tralane gave him a nod and reached out for the sack Marzen had brought up the night before. He chewed on a strip of camulet while he broke the bread and cut cheese. As he ate the latter, he found a water bag containing sweet juice he had overlooked in his first examination of the sack's contents. He took a long draught.

  "Not bad. Certainly a pleasant change from the dull poison I've been eating lately."

  "I hope you've recovered from last night's conversation," Gibron commented, taking some of the fruit.

  "Why yes, I feel much better this morning. It must have been fatigue and all the ill fortune I've been getting lately that made me so moody." Tralane reached over his quiver of arrows and grabbed his pouch, from which he drew out a smaller pouch drawn shut by string. He tossed it to Gibron. "There's the cause of all my troubles," he said carelessly.

  Gibron took Wyden's Eye out and examined it. The central jewel, glinting green and blue, was as large as an average man's palm. Strange shadows and angles played with light. With every movement of Gibron's hand, the lights and shadows shifted into unexpected positions. An intricately fashioned silver setting held the jewel.

  Gibron replaced the amulet in the pouch and returned it to Tralane.

  "You are a strange young man. Last night, I thought I saw you as you truly are, confused and frightened. Now you're back in your flippant mood."

  Tralane continued eating. "Perhaps," he said at last, with caution, "you seek to know others too well."

  "But if I'm to help—"

  Tralane held up his hands in mock surrender. "You're like an overprotective parent, Gibron. You want to know, to help, to do everything for your ward. But I've been on my own for six years. I can handle myself very well. Now, you said we were going to make some plans this morning?"

  Gibron let out an exasperated sigh and opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it and ate a piece of bread instead. "All right, I'll let that pass for now. Last night, I heard Marzen say that the evening would be the best time for you to try to escape. Tonight, I can go down first and distract Rimskiel, while you don a shawl, hunch over, and try to slip out unnoticed. I can follow shortly afterwards, by which time you will have procured some fast thorts."

  "No sorcery?" Tralane asked, disappointed.

  "You forget I'm running from the Golden King. I dare not use strong spells of deception, for that would summon his searching spells to me, and they would destroy us."

  "We could use the amulet up here, though it might be a bit of a fall if there's no tavern on this spot in the world we wind up in."

  Gibron brushed the suggestion aside with a wave of his hand. "From what you've described to me, it is not so easy to cross from one world to another. The doorway is long and the changes gradual, requiring some travel. No, we must wait until we've gained the streets before we can use Wyden's Eye. Hopefully, the Golden King's spells won't be able to follow us through."

  "If Agathom could not reach me as I escaped, then your enemy will not be able to, either."

  "Then let us save our strength for now. I don't think we'll get much chance for resting tonight."

  Gibron finished his meal in silence, then went back to his sleeping mat, crossed his legs and arms as he sat, and withdrew his attention to inner matters. Tralane, shunning such activity, quietly sang a song about his future, Wyden's Eye, and the aspects of life which his companion might be contemplating.

  The day passed like a thick, slow-moving fog, and night fell with an almost imperceptible change of atmosphere. Tralane gauged the time by the angle and brightness of a beam of light which slipped through a crack in the ceiling. He slept fitfully and remained with his dreams even when he was awake. He ate again and took up the time by lazily playing with the straw on the floor, designing intricate mazes. He had learned how to occupy his mind and prevent himself from becoming restless in the small, isolated confines of town prisons and dungeons, where he had spent parts of his youth paying for his inexperience. With Gibron uncommunicative and the mounting volume of noise from below only a reminder of the danger to come, Tralane found the memory of his incarcerations to be his solitary comfort. At least imprisonment had guaranteed his safety and a return to freedom after a moderate sentence of penitence had been served.

  Eventually, Gibron rose.

  "It's about time we left, Tralane," he whispered. The mage wore a dark cloak and carried a small pack over his shoulder.

  Tralane grunted, surprised that he had missed his companion's preparations, and rose to his knees. Gibron went to the ladder and began to descend while Tralane gathered his belongings and straightened his wits.

  He did not feel better for the day's idleness. The morning's freshness and bravado had worn away, to be replaced by doubts and fears. He could not recapture completely his old arrogance.

  He stood, swayed as if pushed and pulled by the contradictory thoughts and feelings he could not quit
e grasp that were swirling in his mind, and finally followed Gibron into the dark hole, his pack, quiver, and bow strapped to his back.

  Voices in revelry echoed in the passageway, and the wall to which the ladder was attached shook with the pounding of feet dancing to wild music and singing. Gibron whispered something to him, but he could not hear. He continued downward until he heard the trap door mechanism creak into operation. He froze as light flooded up into the secret passage from below.

  Gibron motioned impatiently to Tralane. "Hurry up, I said," the mage reiterated, crouching by the trap door. "Go on down. If there are any servants in the room, they'll be wondering why I'm coming down from the attic. Subdue them, quickly."

  Tralane slid down the remaining portion of the ladder and fell into the room. His muscular frame absorbed the impact without injury.

  A woman servant was standing by the cauldron, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. Tralane rushed towards her and knocked her head against the wall before she could scream. A male servant was snoring in a corner, and his slumber was deepened by a blow from a stoking poker.

  Gibron came down gingerly. He pressed the panel on the wall that sent the ladder extension back up and closed the trap door. Then he walked stiffly to the serving maid lying unconscious against the wall.

  "Did I ever tell you this place was once an old king's summer residence?" Gibron asked airily as he inspected the woman's head. "The secret room did not serve him when his time came, though. His belongings fell into the hands of common folk like Rimskiel and his wife. Rimskiel handles the place well, probably puts it to better use than that king ever did. History takes many strange turns, don't you think?" Gibron sighed and pulled some leaves out of his pack, and applied them to the woman's forehead. "You didn't have to hit her so hard, did you?"

  Tralane threw Gibron an exasperated look. "You talk of history now? And why does the girl matter, when her master will probably take great joy in roasting me with his other meats, if he ever catches me?"