Wolfsbane

by Patricia Briggs

  “Yes,” replied Gerem. “Nevyn does it.”

  Nevyn is a dreamwalker? thought Aralorn.

  “Right,” agreed Kisrah. “There are a number of mages who can dreamwalk at the most basic level—fardreaming, it’s called. While fardreaming, a mage can send his spirit outside his body, usually no farther than a mile or two. Dreamwalking, though, is much more powerful and unusual. Nevyn and Geoffrey are the only living mages I’ve heard of who can send their spirits anywhere they want to. Generally speaking, a dreamwalker cannot affect the physical world—like moving chairs or tables. I say ‘generally’ because one or two of the better dreamwalkers were said to have tossed a chair or two.”

  “Or a knife,” added Wolf dryly.

  Kisrah nodded. “I stand corrected. A dreamwalker also cannot work magic in his spirit form. What he can do is look and listen without people suspecting they are being watched. And, though he can’t talk in a normal manner, he can communicate in a fashion called dreamspeaking.”

  “Like a mindspeaker?” asked Gerem.

  Kisrah nodded, “Only better. It takes one mindspeaker to hear another. A dreamspeaker can make himself heard by anyone he wants.”

  Aralorn thought about the conversation she’d overheard and wondered if the dreamwalker who’d been Geoffrey had known that she was there listening.

  “Anyone?” asked Gerem. “I thought that when a wizard becomes an apprentice, his dreams are protected by the Master Spells.”

  “That’s right,” said Kisrah, though his mouth tightened just a little. “Smart lad. Yes, the Master Spells protect young wizards to a certain extent. There are other ways to ward yourself, too. It is possible for a dreamwalker to manipulate an unprotected person through dreams. Unethical, but there you are. But dreamspeaking isn’t any more manipulative than normal speech.”

  Yes, thought Aralorn, watching Gerem as relief touched his face. No need to feel so guilty. You were not protected from the dreamwalker’s manipulations. Kisrah and Nevyn had known what they were doing.

  Aloud, she asked, “Is magic necessary for dreamwalking, or are there dreamwalkers who are not mages?”

  “Dreamwalking is a magic talent, like transporting things or illusions. Geoffrey said”—Kisrah hesitated—“if a dreamwalker’s body is killed while he is walking, his spirit can remain behind. Like a ghost, but with the full consciousness of the living person. He told me that the second time he came. And then he told me how he died.” Kisrah looked at Wolf, who looked back without any expression at all.

  “He told me that you came back because you’d heard that he was looking for you, and you were tired of it. He said that you argued about your use of black magic. He finally tried to use the Master Spells to limit your ability to work magic.” Without dropping his gaze from Wolf’s, Kisrah said, “That’s one of the ways that an ae’Magi can control rogue wizards, Gerem—as a last resort.”

  He seemed to be waiting for a response from Wolf, but after a fruitless pause, Kisrah continued. “In any case, he said he underestimated your power and the strength that black magic had given you; the spell was reversed. There came a point when you could have stopped it. He said you held the power for long enough to say something ironic—I’ve forgotten exactly what—and then you killed him.”

  He believes it, thought Aralorn, at least at this moment.

  “As a point of fact,” said Aralorn mildly, “it didn’t happen like that. I was there. Wolf did not kill Geoffrey; nor did I.” She started to tell them more about the last ae’Magi but caught the subtle shake of Wolf’s head in the corner of her eye. He was right. She had to be careful not to trigger whatever was left of the charisma spells. “He was killed by the Uriah.”

  Kisrah stared at her, but she didn’t drop her gaze.

  “Only the ae’Magi, Wolf, and I were there the night he died,” she continued mildly. “If your visitor was Geoffrey, then he put my father in danger—without Wolf’s cooperation, you three would not be able to remove the ensorcellment from my father. You have the word of a goddess that if it is not removed soon, the Lyon will die. Your dreamwalker asked you to work black magic upon an innocent man—is this something a good man would do? If it was not Geoffrey, then he doesn’t know what happened any more than you do.”

  Kisrah rubbed his eyes. “At any rate, Geoffrey’s story is the one I believed when he asked me to work some magic for him. It was supposed to be for you, Cain. It would not kill you, just hold you for the wizard’s council’s justice. I agreed. He told me that he needed me to find a secret room in his bedroom. So I found the room and the sword he’d hidden there. With his directions fresh in my mind, I inscribed on the sword the rune he told me. Runes are not my strong point, and the one he used was unfamiliar and complex. It required all of my concentration to get it right. Just as I finished the last line, something grabbed my shoulder.”

  He took a deep breath. “There was a Uriah standing just behind me, reflex took over, and I beheaded it with the sword—only then did magic pour into the rune I’d just finished.” Kisrah closed his eyes. “I didn’t know it needed blood magic. I don’t think I did. At the time, I told myself it was an accident that turned the spell black. I wanted to destroy the sword, offered to spell something else for him—anything else.”

  The Archmage sighed. “He said that the sword was the only sure bait, that perhaps the black magic would work in our favor. Even the Master Spells had failed to hold Cain; maybe it would take black magic to counter black magic. Geoffrey was always good at getting his own way by fair means or foul.” He paused, as if surprised by what he’d said. “By the time I realized that he’d intended to use black magic all along, I was already resigned to it. Maybe I’d have done it for him anyway.”

  “Did Geoffrey tell you to send the sword here, or did you suggest it?” asked Aralorn. When the Archmage had died, he knew that she and Wolf were together—but she was certain that he hadn’t made the connection between her and Lambshold. She took great care that most people didn’t know.

  “Geoffrey,” he said. “The night after I brought the sword back with me, he told me he wanted me to send it to Nevyn. He told me that Nevyn’s sister by marriage was Cain’s lover. I sent the sword. Only afterward did I begin to question what I had done.”

  The hen clucked in its crate, reminding everyone in the room (except perhaps for Gerem and Nevyn, who Aralorn was not certain knew what they’d been planning) that black magic was needed to release the Lyon. Aralorn looked at the bird thoughtfully for a moment.

  “Perhaps a more noble motive might have allowed me to shut my eyes longer to what I had done.” Kisrah smiled grimly at Wolf. “I didn’t work the spell to capture Cain and save the world from dark magic—I worked it for revenge. I hated you for taking my friend from me. I knew that the end result of Geoffrey’s plan was your death.”

  “I would have expected no less,” agreed Wolf softly. “I know what he was to you. What was the rune he had you draw?”

  From an inner pocket, Kisrah produced a sheet of paper with two neat drawings he gave to Wolf. Since drawing the rune itself would activate it, rune patterns were split into two drawings that, when laid one over the other, formed the rune. Aralorn had never been able to put the patterns together in her head without getting a headache, but Wolf nodded, as if it made sense to him.

  “What did he have you add to it?” he asked Nevyn.

  Nevyn had taken a seat on the floor where he could lean against the wall, as far from where Wolf stood as he could get. He had listened to Kisrah’s story with his eyes closed; dark shadows and lines of weariness touched his face. At Wolf’s question, he dug into the pouch attached to his belt and mutely handed him two sheets of paper.

  Wolf took them and held them up separately, frowning. “Where did you place it? On the blade as well?”

  Nevyn nodded. “Farther down on the blade, near the point.”

  “Another binding spell of some sort,” said Kisrah after a moment of staring over Wolf’s shoulder.
“Had you seen it before, Nevyn?”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  “Cain?”

  Wolf shook his head as well, but slowly. “Not exactly, no.”

  “Did he ask you to kill anything?” asked Kisrah.

  “No,” said Nevyn. “But what I did was worse.” He turned slightly to address everyone. “I knew that the spell was intended for the Lyon and that he was to be the bait that drew Aralorn and . . . Cain here.” His voice grew quieter. “I—I—I suggested it to him. Aralorn hadn’t come here for ten years. When he asked me what would make her return, I told him that I thought the only thing that would work was if someone died—if Henrick died.”

  He looked at Wolf, and his voice became guttural. “So he put a spell on the Lyon that only you could break. Black magic, he said, so that Kisrah would not know how to unwork the spell. I told him that you might not come, might not expose yourself for someone you didn’t know. So he decided to see if we could trap Aralorn in it as well. I called the baneshade here and set it to extend the spell to Aralorn.”

  “Do you know what he intended to do to Wolf—sorry, Cain—once he was here?” asked Aralorn, interested in what Geoffrey had told Nevyn. “After all, here he is . . . and no one has moved against him.”

  Nevyn shrugged. “Kisrah was to come upon Cain working black magic, and then he’d have to face justice at the ae’Magi’s hands.”

  Kisrah’s bells rang as he started in surprise. “My dear Nevyn, I don’t think I have the power to constrain or kill Cain—you haven’t seen what he can do.”

  “After unworking the spell on the Lyon, he would be in no shape to resist you.” He sat forward suddenly, a bitter twist to his mouth. “You can rot, Cain, for all I care. But Henrick has been more of a father to me than my own ever thought of being, and I helped to trap him. Any magic that binds a person as tightly as he is bound will be tricky to unwork at best. It has become increasingly obvious that Geoffrey doesn’t care if Henrick lives or dies—but I do. If I can help you, I will—if you die in the process, so much the better.”

  “All right,” said Wolf, and Aralorn eyed him sharply.

  “What did you do with the sword after you worked the spell?” asked Kisrah.

  Nevyn drew in a breath. “I gave it to Henrick the day he was enspelled; I met him at the stables as he was leaving to inspect the burnt-out croft. I told him a messenger brought it from Aralorn.” He lowered his eyes. “Henrick gave me his old campaign sword, told me to put it in the armory, and carried the one I’d given him.”

  With a casualness that spoke of more practice than Aralorn had suspected, he gestured with both hands, and a sword appeared on the floor in front of them. “This sword. You see why we knew that he would carry this one.”

  It wasn’t a ceremonial sword, nor was it ornate. But even Aralorn, who was admittedly not the best of sword judges, could see the care that had gone into its making. The pommel was wood, soft finished—nothing spectacular, but high quality nonetheless. It was the blade that attested to the care that had gone into the sword’s making. Countless folds of a repeating pattern marked the blade: a master-work of a talented swordsmith.

  Wolf knelt and ran a hand over it without touching. “There’s no magic to it now other than the power of a sharp blade.” He smiled. “It belonged to my father’s predecessor. I suspect that means it is yours now, Kisrah.”

  “No,” said the Archmage, sounding revolted. “If there’s no more harm in it, then it should be the Lyon’s, assuming you can fix this. He’s paid enough for it.”

  Once he’d called the blade, Nevyn had ignored it completely. Rising to his feet, he walked around Wolf to the bier.

  “He’ll hate me when he knows what I have done.” Nevyn stared at the Lyon’s body.

  “No,” said Aralorn gently. “He never expected any of his children to be perfect. Tell him what you have told us; he’ll understand. He liked Geoffrey, too.”

  Nevyn shook his head.

  “My turn,” said Gerem, flushing when his voice cracked.

  “Your turn,” agreed Aralorn.

  “I’ve been having strange dreams for a long time. Nightmares mostly.” He swallowed heavily. “I don’t really know where to start.”

  They waited patiently, giving him a chance to get his thoughts in order.

  Finally, he looked at Aralorn. “I don’t know what life here was like when you were a child, but to me it always seemed as if I was lost in a crowd. I’m clumsy with a blade and have no interest in hunting some poor fox or wolf. The only thing I can do is ride, but in this family even Freya and Lin do that well. The week . . . the week that Father was ensorcelled, he talked to me once—and that was to ask me if I had any clothes that fit.” Self-consciously, he pulled a sleeve down so it briefly covered the bones in his wrist before sliding back up.

  “One night I dreamed that I saddled my horse and rode up to the old croft. There was a rabbit hiding under a bush that I killed with an arrow. Something happened then . . . when it died I felt a rush of power that filled me until I could hold no more. I walked the fence line of the croft, chanting as the rabbit’s blood dripped to the ground.”

  There was a grim factuality to his story that Aralorn could not help but approve. To a boy who disliked hunting, the realization of what he had done must be sickening.

  “When I was through, I dipped my finger into the rabbit’s death wound, and I was thinking of Father, on how much this would impress him, how proud he would be to have a son who was a mage. I made a mark on the corner post of the fence.”

  “What did the mark look like?” asked Wolf.

  “Two half circles, one above the other—connected bottom to top.”

  Wolf frowned. “Open to the left or right or one each way?”

  “To the left.”

  Wolf closed his eyes as if it allowed him to better visualize the spell.

  Still looking at the drawings, he asked, “You said you were chanting. Do you remember what you said?”

  Gerem frowned. “No. It was in Rethian, though, because I knew what I was saying at the time. I remember thinking that it was strange. I remember that it rhymed.” He was silent for a moment. “Something about feeding, I think. Death, magic, and dreaming, but that’s all I can remember.”

  “And then you burned the croft,” said Wolf.

  Gerem nodded. “They said later there were animals in the barn.” He sounded sick.

  “Be glad there weren’t people,” commented Aralorn.

  “Thanks,” he said sourly, but with a touch of humor. “Now I can have nightmares about that every night, too.”

  “You thought this was a dream?” asked Kisrah.

  Gerem nodded. “Until we received news of the burning of the croft. Even then I didn’t really believe I’d been the one to burn the croft until Father collapsed.” He paused and looked at Aralorn. “I am really glad he isn’t dead. After he was brought back to the keep, I took out my hunting knife—there was dried blood on the blade just beneath the handle where my cleaning cloth might have missed.”

  “Gerem,” said Kisrah, “of all of us here, you hold the least guilt. Without the protection of the spells binding master to apprentice, a dreamwalker of Geoffrey’s caliber could make you do anything he wanted you to. You are no more guilty of killing that rabbit, burning the animals in the barn, or entrapping the Lyon than a sword is guilty of the wounds it opens.”

  Aralorn could have kissed him.

  Gerem’s lips twitched up just a little. “You’re saying that I was just a hatchet that happened to be in the right place at the right time.”

  The Archmage smiled and nodded. “After we free your father, I’ll speak to him about setting up a real apprenticeship.” He turned to Nevyn. “I’ll make certain he doesn’t have your experiences, Nevyn. You should have told—” He stopped when Nevyn flinched and shook his head. “It doesn’t matter now.”

  Wolf folded the drawings and put them into a pouch he carried on his belt.

>   “Do you know enough to release him?” asked Aralorn.

  Wolf hesitated. “I will only get one chance at this. I’d like to think about it a little more. I know where Father kept his favorite spell books: Let me take a day or so to look through them before I try this.”

  “In my library,” said Kisrah dryly.

  “Not exactly,” said Wolf. “Remind me sometime to show you some of the secrets you ought to know about the ae’Magi’s castle. In the meantime, I need to look a few things up.”

  “That sounds like a good idea to me,” said Kisrah. “Do you need any help?”

  Wolf shook his head. “No. There are only two rune books he used—it wasn’t Father’s forte either.”

  Kisrah bit his lip. “May I talk to you in private before you go, Cain?”

  Wolf raised one eyebrow in surprise. “Certainly.” He took Aralorn’s hand and raised it to his lips. “I’ll be back this evening.”

  She smiled and kissed his cheek. “Fine.”

  He turned back to the Archmage. “Shall we walk?”

  Kisrah led the way to the frozen gardens, making no attempt to talk until they were out in the cold.

  “Cain, the Master Spells are missing—or rather half of them are.”

  “What?” Shock broke through Wolf’s preoccupation with the spell he would have to perform in order to free Aralorn’s father.

  “Haven’t you noticed?”

  Wolf shook his head, still feeling disbelief—the Master Spells held the fabric of wizardry together. “They haven’t had any effect on me for a long time.”

  “Without the spells, the position of ae’Magi is no more than a courtesy title. I have no way of controlling a rogue wizard, no way of detecting black magic unless I am in the proximity of whoever is working it. When I found them in Geoffrey’s library, the pages that contained the ae’Magi’s half of the rune spells were missing.”

  Ah, thought Wolf, as he said, “I don’t know where they are.”

  “I believe you,” said Kisrah, leaving Wolf feeling odd—as if he’d braced himself for an attack that hadn’t come. “You had no motive to take them. If anyone could have controlled you with them, Geoffrey would have done so a long time ago. Do you know where he would have hidden them?”