Secrets and Spellcraft

by Michael G. Manning

  “If she’d had a fire elemental protecting her, that wouldn’t have happened. It could have surrounded her and there wouldn’t be anything to pry apart. Any time the demon touched the flames it would be burned to ash. Now do you understand?”

  “I see your point,” said Will. “But this demon armor spell says it doesn’t burn things.”

  “That spell predates the use of fire elementals. It was made by wizards to protect themselves. The flames would be very inconvenient if they hurt one’s allies or set fire to someone’s home. Trust me, they still work just as well on demons, though. The one thing to remember, though, is even though the spell has ‘armor’ in the name, it won’t stop swords, arrows, or pretty much anything else.”

  “So, it isn’t really a battle spell, then,” said Will.

  “It damn well is if you’re staring down a demon,” said the ring. “Other than that, it just looks wicked.”

  “There are battle magics, though, aren’t there?”

  “Another stupid question,” answered the ring. “Of course, there are. But you won’t find them in that book. There’s a few other spells that are good for demons, though.”

  “Why aren’t there some in the book?”

  “Because it’s titled Practical Magic. It’s full of things you’ll actually use. The climbing and unlocking spells, for example, are incredibly useful. It isn’t often you need to kill someone. If that’s what you want, go back home. There’s a book there that has some handy spells in it for dismembering people.”

  “Then why are there spells for demons in the book?”

  The ring paused. “Demons were a much bigger problem back then. Arrogan killed quite a few people near the end, sure, but most of his early fights were against Madrok’s spawn. The only wizard who fought more demons than Arrogan was his friend, Syllanus.”

  The name sounded familiar. “Who was Syllanus?”

  “A wizard,” said the ring. “A good friend of Arrogan’s. One that didn’t truck with sorcerers and compromise his principles like so many of the others did. Why? Did they mention him in your history class?”

  “No. I don’t think so,” said Will. “But it seems like I heard the name somewhere before.”

  Their conversation ended after that and Will packed it in for the night. He was tired, but tomorrow would be a new day.

  Chapter 21

  Will went to Fencing practice the next morning. The others were now sparring with him regularly, though no one showed any interest in talking to him. After they finished, he went to the Bursar’s Office and collected his thirty-six crowns before taking the twelve potions he had made over to Ilona Fretz.

  Then he returned to the dorm to clean up before his History class. Dianne Young stopped him when he came in. “There’s mail for you, Cartwright.”

  The cold formality she treated him with still stung, but he accepted the envelopes with equanimity and took them to his room to read. One of them was simply a quick note from Professor Karlovic telling him that someone had expressed interest in acquiring some universal antidote potions. Will would need to talk to him later to find out the details.

  The second letter was the one Will had been dreading. It came from the head magistrate’s office rather than from Count Spry himself and it spelled out in legal terms that he’d been named as the cause of Dennis Spry’s death and would be required to pay a one thousand crown blood-price. It also gave him two weeks to respond, whether by petitioning the court if he felt he wasn’t at fault or notifying them that he would pay the fine.

  Will went over the math in his head once more. Ilona had told him the college would only pay for another fifty blood-cleansing potions. After collecting the gold for that, he’d have just over six hundred crowns to his name. If he worked on those potions over the weekend and devoted the first two evenings of the next week, he could finish all fifty, leaving him just twelve days to figure out how to raise the other four hundred crowns.

  “There has to be a way,” he told himself.

  The last envelope was different from the others, being smaller and carmine in color. A wax seal bearing the royal crest sealed it. Curious, Will broke the seal and removed an elegant invitation.

  You are cordially invited to attend the Royal Winter Ball, which will take place in Geimhreadh, on the 24th day of Nollag, in the Year of our Lord, 460.

  It went on to detail the type of attire, which was beyond his means unless he continued making money after paying off his blood-price. That didn’t bother him, though. If he could manage to pull together a thousand crowns, he could find a way to come up with another twenty or thirty to pay for a fancy ball. He wouldn’t have been interested at all, if it weren’t for the fact that the event was being thrown by the king, which meant that Selene would almost certainly be there.

  “I’m a fool for thinking of her,” Will muttered. “I’ve got bigger problems and there’s absolutely no way we could ever marry.” He wanted to kick himself. Marry? She was a sorceress. Even if she wasn’t a princess, he shouldn’t be considering such a thing.

  He couldn’t help himself though. His mind was continually concocting fantasies in which they ran away together. He’d convince her to give up the elementals and he’d learn enough to train her in the fundamentals of wizardry that Arrogan had taught him. That’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever had, he told himself, and there are a hundred reasons why it could never happen.

  If he was smart, he’d forget about her and start thinking about women who weren’t completely out of reach, such as Janice Edelman. Sure, she was probably still angry with him, but the notes she had given him proved she didn’t hate him. He found her very attractive too.

  Will spent several minutes trying to construct a similar fantasy involving Janice, but every time his attention wandered, her face transformed into Selene’s.

  He was wasting time. Stripping off his clothes and the brigandine he wore beneath them, he used a spell to give himself a bath. It wasn’t as satisfying as an actual bath with water and soap, but the end result was the same. Then he used a different spell to clean his clothing before a knock on his door distracted him. It had been so long since anyone had visited him that he found himself frozen for a moment as he pondered who it could be.

  Will pulled on his trousers and padded on bare feet to the door before throwing it open. “Hello?”

  Janice stood in the hall, and her eyes traveled over his bare chest for a second before coming to rest on his face. Her cheeks colored as she struggled to regain her composure. “I w-wanted to tell you—” She stopped and turned away. “Could you put something on?”

  He grinned gleefully. “Sorry, I didn’t expect to be entertaining guests.” Turning back, he snatched up his tunic and pulled it over his head. “Come in.”

  She shook her head. “Oh, I couldn’t. I just came to apologize.”

  Will caught her wrist and tugged her through the doorframe before closing the door. “You don’t have to apologize. We only have a few minutes before we have to leave for class anyway.” He gestured to the chair while he sat down to put on his socks and boots.

  “I shouldn’t have come in,” she said. “People might talk.”

  “No one saw you come in anyway,” he replied. “Thank you for the notes. I recognized the handwriting.”

  “I feel bad for how you’ve been treated,” she told him. “I shouldn’t have avoided you. I got a letter from my parents, by the way.”

  “Are they well?”

  Janice nodded. “It seems that Dennis’ father didn’t get word of the cause of your duel, or if he did, he didn’t take it out on them. Unfortunately, he told them he wouldn’t be sponsoring me after this semester.”

  “That’s terrible!” exclaimed Will. “Wait, then why is he no longer sponsoring you?”

  “Dennis isn’t here anymore, so he doesn’t need anyone to clean up after the little monster. In any case, I’ll have to leave, so it was pretty pointless of me to avoid you,” said Janice. “I thought maybe
I could help you with Composition, at least until then.” Her gaze fell on the brigandine vest. “What’s that?”

  “I’ll show you,” said Will. He needed to put it on before he could finish dressing anyway. He started removing his tunic once more and she closed her eyes. Will laughed as he picked up the armored vest and slipped it on. “I’m not bare-chested anymore,” he told her. “It’s safe.”

  Of course, the brigandine vest was still open in the front, but he was already closing it as he fastened the buckles in the front. That done, he pulled his tunic back on and cinched it around his waist with his belt. He rapped on his chest with one fist so she could hear the metallic sound of the plates inside.

  “Armor? Why are you wearing armor?”

  “Just being cautious.” He handed her the letter he had just gotten from the magistrate.

  Her eyes went wide when she saw the sum he was required to pay. “By the Holy Mother! What are you going to do?”

  He explained his potion-making scheme, then added, “I can come up with six hundred, but I’m sure I’ll find a way to make the rest.”

  She shook her head. “I still don’t understand.”

  “Understand what?”

  “Why you did it.”

  “You said your parents would get tossed out if Dennis started telling lies to—”

  Janice sighed. “No. Why you did it. I had every reason to do something like that, if I’d had a way to get away with it, but you didn’t. Now you’re being forced to pay that enormous sum of gold. You barely know me.”

  Will nodded. “I’m a little stupid, my grandfather used to tell me that all the time.”

  “And because of me you’re—”

  He held up his hand. “No, you’re missing the point. It wasn’t because of you. It could have been anyone and I probably would have done the same thing. I have a penchant for bad decisions.”

  She stared at him for a moment. “I don’t have much, but I still have a few crowns left over. I’ll try to figure out if there’s another way to get more. Maybe I could help you with the potions. You shouldn’t bear the cost alone. How many years will that take off your life?”

  “None,” said Will. He wanted to lie about it, as he had with everyone else, but that would only make her guilt worse.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she responded. “You might be stupid, but I certainly am not, and I’ve been paying attention in class.”

  “Listen,” said Will. “I have quite a few secrets and I can’t share most of them, for one reason or another. Maybe I can later, but all I can say right now is that using magic doesn’t use up my life the way it does for everyone else.”

  “Are you a sorcerer? Do you have a secret elemental hidden away somewhere?”

  “No. Never that,” he said emphatically. “Come on. We need to leave, or we’ll be late to class.”

  ***

  After his classes were done Will went to the Alchemy building and found Professor Karlovic in his office. “I got your message.”

  The professor smiled. “We had an inquiry and I thought you might be interested.”

  “How much are they paying?”

  “Twenty crowns each, and they want five. Can you have them ready by Tuesday?”

  Will nodded. “Definitely.” He could put off finishing the blood-cleansing potions and spend Sunday working on the universal antidote. The material cost for the antidote potion was higher, but even so he would make a profit of seventy-five crowns. After that it would only take a little over three hundred to reach his goal. It seemed as though his luck was finally taking a turn for the better.

  He spent the rest of the evening making preparations to create the universal antidotes, paying for the materials with some of the coin he had already made and setting up the equipment for the first steps. With that done, he went to bed at his usual time and started early the next day.

  There was some time involved in the procedure, so he wouldn’t be able to finish them until the next day, so once the first steps were completed, he worked on the finishing steps for more of the blood-cleansing potions. By planning his time carefully, he finished all five of the antidotes over the weekend and still managed to complete ten more of the blood-cleansing potions.

  He had the workshop to himself Sunday afternoon as he worked, so during a break he woke up the ring for a conversation.

  “What is it now?” asked the ring.

  He told it about his latest project, but before he could finish it interrupted him. “And you need my help for that? Can’t you do anything on your own?”

  “That’s not it,” said Will. “I was just wondering if you can think of anything else I can do to earn money. I’m still going to be about three hundred crowns short and my time is running out.”

  The ring thought about it for a while before answering, “Actually, I was wondering why your dabbler of a professor didn’t ask you to do a potion of regeneration. Back in Arrogan’s day those were pretty valuable and considering the amount of turyn that goes into one I’d guess they’d be almost unheard of now.”

  “What does it do?” asked Will.

  “I’d think it would be self-explanatory, given the name.”

  Will sighed. “Regeneration could mean a lot or just a little. Give me an idea how much it can do.”

  “Well, it won’t cure a bad case of the piles,” snickered the ring. “It won’t help with brain injuries, disease, or poisons, but as long as a person is breathing, it’ll damn near fix anything else.”

  “Can it grow something back?”

  “Why? Did someone bite off your little friend?”

  “You know what I mean. Can it regrow and arm or a leg?”

  “Sort of?”

  Exasperated, Will let his impatience show in his voice. “Can you just explain it? Don’t make me keep fishing for answers.”

  “Where’s the fun in that? All right, fine. No, it won’t grow back lost limbs. It’s also slow. It lasts about an hour and if you’ve got a serious wound it’ll incapacitate you while it’s working. Say for example you had a friend with a spear through his belly, if you get the spear out and give it to him before he bleeds to death, he’ll be right as rain. The potion will knock him out, of course, and he probably won’t wake up for a day or two, but that’s a small price for not dying.”

  Will couldn’t help but think that the potion sounded more like a miracle than magic. “What’s the downside?”

  “It tastes bad,” said the ring. “But anyone who’s taken medicine before should expect that.”

  “That’s it?”

  “It tastes really bad, and the smell is awful enough to make you wish you’d been sprayed by a skunk so you could forget the rotten stench you just got a whiff of. One of the ingredients is a little difficult to acquire too, which was the main reason it was rare in Arrogan’s day.”

  I knew there’d be a catch, thought Will. “What is it?”

  “Troll piss.”

  “Are you swearing, or was that a joke?”

  The ring chuckled. “Neither, no wait, actually all of the above plus one. It’s a great swear, it’s funny, and it’s also the damn truth.”

  Will growled. “Troll piss!”

  “I just said that a second ago. You can’t help but repeat the obvious, can you?”

  “No, I was swearing,” snapped Will. “Why’d you bother telling me about regeneration potions if there’s no way I can get the ingredients? Actually, while we’re at it—why did Grandfather have me waste something so valuable? Do you know he used to make me pour the stuff around his garden?”

  The ring sighed contentedly. “It works great for keeping deer and other vermin out of a garden too. It lasts for months!”

  “But it was a waste,” insisted Will. “Think of the lives that he could have saved. Or if that wasn’t enough motivation, he could have made the potions and sold them! It would have really been nice if there had been some sort of inheritance stored in the limnthal!”

  “There was an
inheritance,” argued the ring.

  “Butter does not count.”

  “Say that again the next time you are days from civilization and you’re on the verge of starving to death. You’ll never want for fresh bread and butter, you ungrateful wretch.”

  Will sulked silently.

  The ring said nothing for a minute, but finally it relented. “Fine. You’re such a sour puss. I wouldn’t have mentioned it if there wasn’t a way for you to acquire the liquid gold you require.”

  “I’ve never seen a troll. No one I know has ever seen a troll, and the only congruence point to Muskeglun that Arrogan ever told me about is back in his basement in Barrowden,” said Will. “So exactly how do you propose I find a troll and persuade him to pee in a jar for me?” A sudden realization hit him then. “Wait! Did he have some stored in his workshop?”

  “Definitely,” answered the ring. “But I believe you just told me he had you pour it around his garden.”

  “Wouldn’t he have had more?”

  “Not likely. He hated Muskeglun. You will too. It’s a terrible place.”

  It took Will a moment to process the ring’s words. “I will too—wait, you want me to go there?”

  “Why not? He used to make regular trips there. If he could do it, you could too.”

  “But I don’t know enough magic to survive in a place like that,” protested Will.

  The ring began to laugh. “Magic isn’t very much use in Muskeglun. In fact, it’s almost better to not be a wizard than to be one.”

  “Why?”

  “A normal wizard is used to using magic. Actually, let me clarify that. A proper wizard, of the sort Arrogan trained you to be, is used to using magic. Not only that, but a proper wizard has his source compressed, so he doesn’t generate very much turyn of his own. Muskeglun is almost the exact opposite of Faerie—there’s very little ambient turyn. For a regular human, that’s not a problem, because they generate the proper amount of turyn to sustain themselves, but for someone like you, you have two options.”

  “Which are?”