The Elder Witches

by R.E. Packer

  Chapter 12

  I found the tavern easy enough. I wouldn’t have needed the directions my new friends at the registrator’s office gave me as the tavern was within eyesight of the castle’s front gates. A crowd had formed outside the tavern, peering in the window, murmurs rippled through the crowd. Pushing through the spectators, ignoring their stares, I made my way inside. I found the wizard just as easily. Even if I couldn’t see his magic, which it turns out I could, I would have spotted him. He wore a black leather cloak and had a large staff laying on the table in front of him. His long beard swept the table with each turn of his head. He was swaying back and forth to some unknown tune.

  I gave a curt nod to the man as I walked past toward the bar, glancing back at the red rimmed eyes staring at me.

  I only wanted to put some water in my bottle to hopefully open another doorway to back home. Why I needed water, I had no idea, but the voice was adamant that the recipe was what I needed. I couldn’t exactly converse with the voice and it didn’t quite talk to me. It was more like a feeling mixed with suggestions from somebody just out of reach.

  Looking over my shoulder in the mirror over the bar I saw the wizard behind me. His hand rested on his staff, his eyes still boring holes in me. I looked at him using my Sight, what I saw almost made me recoil.

  There was an oily black creature attached to his back. I made eye contact with the beast. It’s yellow eyes held my gaze as it hissed at me, digging it’s claws in deeper. The wizard cried out. He swatted at his back out of reflex, where the creature held fast. His hand didn’t make contact, but slowed down like it was passing through molasses. The color drained from his face. He pulled his hand free, sagging deeper in his seat.

  The bartender was a portly middle-aged fellow with a horseshoe of hair on his head, and the only other person in the tavern. He didn’t so much walk over as creep over, keeping an eye on the wizard at the table and me at the same time. He mopped sweat from his brow as he took my order, never making eye contact, his head bobbing up and down a bit too much.

  Setting a pitcher of water in front of me, he scurried away again toward the other end of the bar.

  Not wanting to draw more attention to myself I took the pitcher of water and headed to a dark corner of the tavern.

  I gave a short nervous laugh as I approached the wizard’s table. He relaxed slightly, white knuckles easing up on his staff. The tables were tight trying to get past him to the back corner of the room. I edged past, free hand up in a truce gesture, as I got my first good look at the wizard. His sunken eyes and bent posture weren’t a sign of age, it was sickness. The creature that hung to him was killing him. He was having to use magic to heal himself. An acrid smell filled my nose, it was a mix of burnt rubber and spoiled food.

  His goblin growled and hissed it’s displeasure at me. It seemed aggravated that I could see it, and sank one clawed foot into it’s the man’s neck, lashing out at me with both clawed hands. Using my Sight, I could see the magic that surrounded the beast. The creature glowed with power. Unlike the witches that only showed magic on parts of their body, it showed magic everywhere.

  Before I know what I was doing, I set my pitcher of water down and grabbed the gremlin the same as I had the orb that beady tried to cook me with back home. I pulled hard but it hung tight to the wizard digging its claws in.

  I could hear gasps from the crowd outside that had gathered to watch. It must have looked like I was wrestling with a ghost. The man howled in pain as he struggling to pull away from me. After a minute of pulling with all my might, the thing hadn’t budged. I realized I hadn’t said a word to the wizard. Indeed, I hadn’t even been paying him much mind, just the goblin.

  Looking down I saw he had a knife on the table in front of him that had slipped from his sweat slickened grip. I had a feeling if I’d tried this before he was this weak he would have used that knife to fend me off— even if I was trying to help.

  “Hold still, I have an idea,” I said hoping he understood me.

  This time I didn’t grab the gremlin, I sank my hands into it. It was only magical energy, no different than I could feel coming from the Earth— and the same as I felt from this other world as well.

  I concentrated on absorbing the energy. The gremlin realized what I was doing at once and fought back violently. It lashed out with it’s clawed hands trying to shred my arms. Every time it struck, I absorbed the blow and some of it’s energy until it finally let go. Once it was free from the man it lost it’s will to fight. What remained was easily rolled up like a ball of clay, which I added to my bottle. It swirled black in the bottle, mixing with the red energy already in the bottle.

  As I stowed my bottle and caught my breath, the wizard already looked better. The color rose in his face from the ghostly pale it had been.

  “You healed me…” he said. His hand crept back onto his staff.

  “I removed the magic goblin— or demon— or whatever it was,” I said.

  His eyes, much sharper than only a moment before evaluated me.

  “I thought you were going to kill me… I was too weak to defend myself, “ he said.

  I didn’t know why he thought I would kill him and didn’t know what to say so I didn’t say anything. He paused, then released his grip on the staff, but kept his hand nearby.

  “Some wizards see each other as a threat. On some worlds you are killed as a preemptive measure,” he said as if that explained everything.

  No wonder the guy was acting so strange. On some worlds you were killed just for having magic. I thought about the government agency that Reynolds had found out about. Maybe it wasn’t so bad, at least it was only a few wizards after you, not the entire government.

  “What was that thing?”

  “A very powerful wizard put that curse on me. The spell was draining my magic, and would have continued until I had none left. Then it would have killed me by draining my soul.”

  “Well, I’m sure you would have done the same for me,” I said, but not really feeling it since he’d just told me on his world wizards kill each other for sport.

  He looked down at his hands and the knife laying there. “No, I don’t suppose I would have,” he said. “I’ve had too many bad encounters to trust that somebody stronger than me wouldn’t just kill me as thanks.”

  It occurred to me that he still might be willing to kill me just in case. I reached behind my back, feeling for the reassuring bulge of metal holstered there.

  “There’s one more thing,” he said starting to rise. At his full height he was almost a foot taller than my 6 foot frame and not the frail man I first saw.

  Mistaking his intention I said, “I don’t want any trouble, as soon as I make my potion, I’ll be trying to leave this place.”

  “I’ve never seen anybody remove that spell.”

  “Beginners luck, I’ve always had a knack for trying new things,” I said.

  “I’ve never heard of anybody ever surviving it. Not even in stories from our ancestors has anybody ever done what you just did,” he said.

  “I could see it attacking you, then I got an idea on how to remove it. Honestly, I wasn’t sure it would work, this is all new to me,” I said.

  His long beard moved back and forth, matching eyebrows raised. “New to you? How is that possible, you removed a spell from one of the strongest wizards in all the worlds. A spell known to be impossible to remove.”

  “A prophecy?” I said lamely.

  “Prophecies are powerful events… they usually affect far more than was foresaw. Sometimes for the amusement of the god that created it,” he said.

  “My name is Eros, from Arkala, I’m in your servitude for saving my life. But I need to warn you, Maleos will seek retribution for saving me. With any luck it will go unnoticed.”

  I glanced at the window and the crowd of people still gathered there.

  I learned that Maleos is the most powerful wizard they had seen on his world in centuries. Many wizards figh
ting together couldn’t defeat him. Twelve others had received the same spell that Eros did. Then he was sent to this world and didn’t have the strength to return home.

  After listening to Eros’ story I politely said my goodbyes and headed back in the direction that I’d arrived. I looked back and saw Eros’s long stride easily keeping pace with me, but still looking ill from the effects of the ghoulish attack.

  “This is exhausting,” he said. “Why don’t you jump?”

  “Jump? And why are you following me?”

  “I told you I’m in your servitude. Maleos will eventually come looking for me and then for you for freeing me. You will need my help. But we will never leave if you don’t jump where you’re going.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said, getting annoyed at other people continually knowing more about my powers than I did.

  “Give me your hand before I end up dying on this day after all.”

  I stuck my hand out, his long thin fingers were shaky but strong. We disappeared from where we stood, the world distorted and blurred for a few seconds. Then we stood on the road I had come in on.

  “That was a jump, some call it other things,” he said. “The important thing is a wizard of your capacity should know how to do that. It’s one of the most useful tools you can have.”

  I had a vision in my head of the plan for the potion that I needed to leave this place. New ideas kept coming unbidden all the time. I needed to mix the water with the magic, then to put my finger into the bottle and concentrate on what I needed from it. A lot of the water had sloshed out of the glass pitcher I’d been carrying. I should have done this in the tavern like I’d planned. I carefully poured the remaining water in until the it was almost to the top. Then I put my index finger in the bottle, making sure to seal it completely. I turned it upside down, closed my eyes, and pictured my magic flow out of me to form a doorway. When I opened my eyes, the water was glowing brightly but there was still no doorway.

  Eros stood watching me as I stared at my newly mixed concoction.

  “I think you have to drink it,” he said encouragingly, and if not a little too interested. Maybe he was curious about what would happen when I drank it too.

  I swirled the bottle and watched as red and black luminescent liquids mixed together glowing brighter. Fleeting images swam past too fast to make out what they were. The mixture smelled of ozone and my sinuses tingled as I raised the bottle to my mouth working up the nerve to drink. The bottle met my lips before I knew it was happening. A soothing voice, not quite my own said ‘How many people could say they visited a strange world, saved a wizard, bottled magic (literally), created a potion and then drank it?’ Damn few, that’s how many, so if I get taken out with a bottle of wizard juice, so be it.

  I gulped the mixture, it was sour and made my tongue buzz like a hundred bees were on it. Energy flooded through my body, amplifying my senses. Voices met my ears as my hearing intensified allowing me to hear conversations from the town over a mile away. Looking back over my shoulder I saw the woman who had been with the registrator. Her eyes were squinted as she looked in our direction through the spy glass she held. Then she leaned closely to the registrator’s ear, who scribbled away in a small notebook. If she said anything, she spoke too quietly to hear.

  Eros put his hand on my shoulder. “Think about jumping to where you want to go.”

  Tearing my eyes away from the woman, I did as he suggested. This time, instead of a doorway opening, we went back into the blurry otherworld space. Sounds were muted. Glimpses of cities, deserts and oceans us passed by. As we stepped out of the jump stream there was a popping noise.

  We had arrived in a more modern world. Automobiles traveling the streets. But something had gone wrong, this wasn’t Earth. None of the cars made any noise. It was like they were powered by something other than gasoline engines. The pedestrians had something else about them that was different but I couldn’t place it.

  “No no no— you’ve taken us to my home world!” Eros said frantically. “We must leave at once— there might be traps in place waiting to see if I return— even if that chance is very small.” His eyes darted non stop around the street looking for something. He gripped his staff with white knuckles, which only glowed dimly, a result of not enough time to recharge his magic.

  “Don’t you want to try to help your friends that were cursed also? Or let your family know you’re not dead?” I said. It had been a complete accident to jump to this world but since we were here, and I didn’t want to admit it was an accident, we might as well try to help his people.

  The big man trembled slightly, and had grown increasingly twitchy. “No... If Maleos finds I have escaped his spell, he will kill us both; plus our families and friends and their families,” Eros said.