Blackest Knights

by Phipps, C. T.

  “What do you want?” D’Marei countered, flatly.

  “You run away from home without so much as a fare-thee-well and don’t contribute a shim to our parents’ upkeep?”

  “Are they unwell?”

  “Do you care?”

  D’Marei would like to have said he did, but he would not lie to himself.

  Cindor gazed back at him with dark, piercing eyes that dared him to speak. Seeing he would not, Cindor said, “So, you’ve decided to take up hedge-witchery…”

  “I’m an alchemist.”

  “Right. Mucking about with sand and sulfur. Be careful you don’t blow your face off.” Cindor paused for a retort that never came and tried again. “I might’ve known I’d find you in a place like this, amongst the vermin.”

  “Well,” D’Marei quipped, “they do say opposites attract. Just like you and decent folk.”

  Cindor blasted him out of his chair and halfway across the chamber. “Speak to me like that again, little brother, and I’ll set you ablaze.”

  D’Marei struggled to his feet, his back aching terribly. “You’ve entered my home uninvited and insulted me! What is it you want, anyway?”

  “Only to satisfy my curiosity, and, sadly, things are just as I suspected.”

  “Why do you hate me so?” D’Marei asked.

  “Hate you? Is that what you believe?” Cindor responded. “It’s nothing so grand as hatred, Dem. You embarrass me. You’re meek, fragile and foolish. We’ll never be able to work together.”

  Who says I’d ever wish to work with you? D’Marei looked down at his hands, avoiding his brother’s glare. He wanted this conversation over; he wanted his brother gone. Perhaps Cindor could read his mind, for the Shaper Jumped away without another word.

  The whole altercation left D’Marei feeling depressed—not so much because of anything his brother had said, but because his visit meant that Dem had to leave, to find a new home and clientele.

  After a lengthy search, he settled in an abandoned charnel house in Teshton. The place had a bad reputation and the locals steered clear of it, making it ideal for the alchemist’s purposes. He was within walking distance of just about anything he might require, and yet he lived in comfortable darkness and solitude.

  In an odd way, Cindor’s visit had inspired him. He now had many projects related to preventing a repeat: an elixir that prevented a person from being found through magical means, a dust that made a person invisible to any Shapers within ten paces or so, and, lastly, a magic-suppressing potion that temporarily robbed a Shaper of his spell-casting abilities. The trick with that last one was in getting the timing right. D’Marei supposed there might be circumstances in which he’d want a Shaper to lose his powers immediately, but as he planned to lure his brother into drinking it, he wanted the bastard well out of range when he lost his powers. If things fell out as Dem hoped, the results could be catastrophic for Cindor and possibly even lethal.

  Before he completed his projects, alas, his brother returned with a couple of apprentices, to mock and sneer at D’Marei, his lifestyle, and his work.

  “How did you find me?” the alchemist nearly groaned when Cindor and his companions appeared.

  “Oh, please!” Cindor replied. “Anyone could find you, brother. Just look for the nearest shithole.” Cindor’s two apprentices snorted and chuckled, and D’Marei immediately promised himself that he’d hurt them both.

  “And what is it you want?” he snapped.

  The smile faded from Cindor’s already severe countenance, and his expression became downright funereal—appropriately so, as it turned out. “I thought you might like to know our parents have passed away.”

  D’Marei nodded but said nothing.

  “No questions? Not remotely curious to know the details?” Cindor challenged.

  “Not really.”

  In an instant, the alchemist was wracked with pain, as Cindor snarled at him through gritted teeth. “You really are the worst of the worst, aren’t you?”

  “Oh,” Dem gasped, “I couldn’t possibly take that title from you.”

  “Destroy this place!” Cindor roared at his companions. “Remind my brother what it means to suffer.”

  What though they were only apprentices, three-against-one was far too big a challenge for D’Marei to handle, and the evening ended with him face-down in a puddle of his own blood and vomit, covered in scorched timbers, broken masonry and endless dust.

  What pained him worse than all that, however, was having to start over again. He resolved to try the capital, Lunessfor. There, he hoped, three Shapers would be forbidden and prevented from destroying another man’s home and livelihood. There, he hoped, the law might protect him.

  And so it did, but it was not the only factor in the period of relative peace that followed for the alchemist. As Cindor grew in power, he likewise rose in the ranks governmental power and had, as Dem had learned, acquired a post in the castle, working for the Queen herself. The busier he became, it seemed, the less time he had for tormenting his younger brother. During this time, too, D’Marei finally perfected the elixir that cloaked his whereabouts from magical searches. If Cindor wanted to find him now, he’d have to do it the hard way, by going door-to-door and interrogating everyone he met, and he scarcely had time for that. Not in a city the size of Lunessfor.

  D’Marei did not waste the reprieve his brother’s preoccupation had given him. He established alternate hideouts, set numerous traps throughout the city that could only be sprung upon Shapers practicing their art, and became fearfully skilled in his own trade. Indeed, he even became wealthy, after a fashion, and gained powerful allies in spite of himself.

  Decades passed. Wars came and went, and D’Marei even espied the great Tarmun Vykers on one occasion, but little else changed in his relationship with his brother, except, perhaps, that his hatred of Shapers in general continued to grow. Now, he killed them whenever he had the chance, always making certain their deaths appeared accidental or as carefully orchestrated assassinations by members of the city’s ever-warring nobility.

  Because he knew he could not evade his brother forever, Dem got into the habit of leaving a half-empty glass of wine on his work-bench just after sundown each evening. It was very expensive wine, and he poured it fresh every time, for he believed that the best way to catch a rat was to offer the very best bait.

  One chilly autumn evening when the air was thick with wood smoke, the rat appeared. Something crossed the circle of blue dust D’Marei had sprinkled about the perimeter of his laboratory and the whole room was briefly illuminated with indigo fire. Just as Cindor appeared, D’Marei disappeared.

  “Ah, well done, well done, little brother!” the Shaper laughed. As it was not a merry sort of laugh, D’Marei remained invisible. “I see your talent has grown. Perhaps I could speak to the Queen and find a position for you on her staff…”

  By means of a number of crystals secreted about the chamber, Dem was able to make his reply seem to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, thus concealing his actual position. “You’d have me believe you’ve gone soft in your old age? The more fool, you.”

  Cindor sighed. “It is true I have not been the best of brothers to you, Dem. But I have had a certain…maturation, call it…forced upon me in my service to Her Majesty.”

  “So you say.”

  “Allow me to prove it.”

  “How did you find me this time?”

  “Alas…” Cindor began, “that is something I cannot divulge.”

  “So much for maturation. What is it you want this time? I see you’ve brought none of your lackeys along with you. Do you plan to destroy my home by yourself?”

  An awkward silence fell upon the brothers, and Dem saw that whereas he had gotten puffy and paunchy over the years, his brother had become even more lean, and his skin looked like leather stretched over a drum.

  “You look haggard. Is that the burning we all hear so much about?”

  Cindor coughed a short
, bitter laugh. “You have no idea.”

  “What if I could neutralize the pain?”

  A flash of hope came to Cindor’s eyes, but it faded just as rapidly. “Do you think I haven’t tried? Do you think every Shaper who’s ever lived hasn’t tried? Even the great Pellas couldn’t manage it.”

  “Perhaps it’s not a magical question, but a chemical one.”

  Cindor pondered this comment for the longest time and then changed the subject. “You’ve got to stop killing my Shapers.”

  “Your Shapers?”

  “Yes, mine. I’m now First Shaper to Her Majesty. You must stop. I cannot and will not warn you again.”

  “Or you’ll kill me.”

  “Yes.”

  More silence.

  “Are they meant to be my surrogates, those other Shapers?” Cindor asked. “My proxies?”

  “Perhaps.” D’Marei appeared, rubbing his face with both hands and slowly reaching for his half-empty glass of wine.

  “Could I have some of that?” Cindor asked abruptly. “That is, assuming it’s any good?”

  “Help yourself,” D’Marei answered. “I’ll look for another glass.”

  As it was apparently wine that Dem had been drinking himself, Cindor took an exploratory sniff, liked what he smelled, and took a healthy swallow. “Well, at least you’re not skimping on the finer things,” he said with great satisfaction. “A wonderful vintage, this.”

  Returning with his own glass, D’Marei poured himself an ample serving and drank deeply. “I recognize quality when I see it.”

  “Or taste it,” Cindor added needlessly.

  In short order, the brothers polished off the whole bottle, and the Shaper was unquestionably drunk. For a moment, he cocked his head at an angle as if listening to something, and then announced, “I must leave. Have to put down a brawl in the North Hill District. Remember what I said. Stop killing, or you will die.” With that, he Jumped out of D’Marei’s shop, and the alchemist lost no time in packing up everything of worth. Within the next half hour, Cindor would lose all Shaping ability for a day to a day-and-a-half. There was no telling how he’d fare in a brawl without his spells, but it made D’Marei laugh heartily as he wondered about it.

  He guessed that his preference for dreary accommodations had been the giveaway, so he rented a suite of rooms amongst the wealthier merchants in town and hired a young woman, one Trinta, to act as the front for all his business. If no one ever saw him, he reasoned, no one could point the way to his home. It all seemed like a brilliant plan until he fell in love with Trinta. Short, with a mop of unruly hair and a sharply pointed nose, she was no beauty. But she took no shit from anyone and seemed an endless fount of witty retorts when dealing with pushy customers or unrelenting bill collectors. D’Marei admired her spirit and self-confidence and, for a while, their relationship flourished. Ultimately, though, she found him too obsessed with his work, and he found her too demanding by half. Their parting was as cold as the bottom of any frozen pond. She would be the only lover he’d ever have. The ruin of that relationship made the alchemist even more reclusive and bitter than he’d been before.

  D’Marei threw himself back into his work. His days and nights were filled with Theuliah resin, Wildside mushrooms, Canris lichen, Oursine bile, Marabas salt, tincture of Alys Flower and other such mysteries and delights of the trade. He knew the name of every poison in existence and the properties of every mineral. He began to dissect animals and then men, to better understand the effect of various substances upon the living. He even dabbled, briefly, in necromancy, but felt its applications were too limited to justify spending much time on it.

  Then, one day, a young woman came into his shop, requesting his assistance on behalf of the Reaper, Tarmun Vykers. Oh, he’d seen the man from a distance once, but the chance to conduct business with him presented too many possibilities to ignore. After all, D’Marei had alienated his brother and, presumably, the Queen into the bargain. With enemies like those, he could use an ally like the Reaper…if he could negotiate their transaction correctly. Vykers, the young woman said, hated Shapers and wished to become invisible to their scrying. Dem could not have dreamed of a request more-suited to his own machinations and was only too happy to oblige his new customer. The best way to curry favor, he suspected, was to perform beyond expectations, and he knew his elixir would do just that. As the young woman left his shop, D’Marei could not but smile. The thought of his brother staring down the Mahnus-cursed Reaper was almost unbearably delightful.

  One evening, the alchemist decided to step outside for the first time in days, only to discover his face plastered across every public wall in town. The Queen, it seemed, was offering a bounty on D’Marei’s head, which was either evidence that she and Cindor had reached the limit of their patience with his mischief…or a not-so-crafty ruse intended to flush him from hiding. Dem did not move but instead began planning for the end-game. He expected they’d find him eventually, and he wanted to make their arrival as costly and painful as possible.

  Before that time came, however, D’Marei had another visitor whose mission changed the alchemist’s plans forever.

  The fellow was huge—bigger, even, than the Reaper himself. What’s more, he was ugly, due mostly to the fact that the left side of his face had been torn off, but he showed no embarrassment at his condition. After some brief gamesmanship between the two, the visitor confessed he’d been sent to kill D’Marei, which was flattering, really, since the brute seemed capable of leveling an entire village by himself. All that destructive potential for one little alchemist? Dem reached a decision on the spot and offered his head to the stranger if only he’d come back the next evening to claim it. Such a deal! And it must have seemed that way to the stranger, too, for he accepted Dem’s terms and left without further discussion.

  Through his studies in medicine, anatomy, and necromancy (among other things), D’Marei knew of a way to prolong the life of his head and body even whilst separated from one another. It was tricky, of course, but if he could thereby succeed in convincing Cindor that he’d finally succeeded in killing his little brother, it was worth the risk. And, if he was honest, Dem had a certain morbid curiosity about process and outcome himself. To recover from his own beheading? What an achievement that would be!

  He was a little chagrined, though, at how easily Trinta accepted the opportunity to remove his head. He’d have thought she’d have misgivings, but she quite literally jumped at the chance. Such is love.

  The next evening, the brute returned and found the alchemist’s head waiting for him, as promised. The big man was curious about the circumstances surrounding his target’s decapitation, but not too much so. D’Marei was able to hurry him along with a pre-arranged bit of street magic and the brute lost interest in the whys and wherefores of the whole charade. He was, it seemed, the kind of man who just wanted to get a thing done so he could move onto the next chore.

  He was also the kind of man who cared nothing for subtlety. Dem had been expecting to have his head placed into a sack of some sort and perhaps hidden under the brute’s cloak. Instead, he carried the alchemist’s head under his arm, like a round of bread, or he palmed it like a cheese, in open view of everyone he passed by. What a spectacle it must have been, Dem thought: his newly-severed head, carried in plain sight by such a huge and hideous monster. He almost betrayed himself by smiling as they traveled along the darkened streets. He would have laughed, even, if he’d still been connected to his lungs.

  He learned something, too, from the frightened, superstitious murmurings of the passersby, too, for over and over they referred to the brute as “The Dead ’Un.” “‘Ware the Dead Un!” they’d say, or “Run for your lives, the Dead ’Un’s coming.” At first, he thought himself their so-called Dead ’Un. But as the minutes passed and he continued to hear the name with impressive regularity, he knew it could never belong to someone as reclusive as he. No, the man who carried him was the Dead ’Un. D’Marei was just the Dead �
��Un’s latest victim.

  At last, the Dead ’Un sauntered right past the castle guards and into the castle itself.

  Luck was on D’Marei’s side, for his brother was unavailable to receive the alchemist’s head, so the Dead ’Un brought it back to his own chambers, where he set it on a table and forgot about it. As soon as the brute was out of the room, Dem summoned his body through an Escarian Portal—an alchemical rift of his own invention—and waited until it appeared to reunite his two parts. It was an odd and temporarily disorienting experience but that and the weeks of pain that would follow were worth the effort, for it all put him inside the castle, where he could snoop for days if he so chose.

  He learned many valuable secrets during that time but stumbling upon his brother’s head was by far the most astonishing, unexpected and gratifying. He’d overheard some guards speaking of it and followed them to their station. After putting them to sleep, he entered the room they’d been protecting and immediately saw Cindor staring at him, from the dubious comfort of a padded bowl. Before the Shaper could attack him, D’Marei addled his mind with a cloud of Hag’s Breath and then wrapped his head in fabric for transport.

  And that was how he’d come into possession of his brother’s head, which was surprisingly light for all the knowledge and self-importance it contained. The next challenge, of course, was how to extract the one without the other. Dem’s past forays into anatomy and necromancy, combined with his already unsurpassed knowledge of alchemy had taught him a thing on two about the brain, and he was confident it could be done. And it had to be done before Cindor regained his wits.

  Despite his being only a head, however—and an extremely damaged one at that—Cindor had magical protections around his remains that made intrusion difficult. D’Marei needed some means, some extraordinary means, by which he could render his brother’s brain quiescent.

  And then, weeks later, serendipity intervened in the form of a rag-tag band of imbeciles.

  They arrived without warning, in the middle of one of D’Marei’s attempts to penetrate Cindor’s defenses. A motley band they were, that included a one-eyed rummy, a young man nearly as pale as Dem himself, a tall, rather smug fellow with impossibly crisp diction, and the stupidest Shaper living. He doubted the lot of them could steal horseshit from the nearest stable without running afoul of the High Constable. Cindor had regenerated to the point where his neck had grown a nascent torso, though it still lacked arms and legs. D’Marei’s unwanted customers entered just as he was moving his brother from the counter to the floor so that Cindor’s head was just sinking out of sight behind said counter, in all likelihood making the alchemist look like he’d been caught in the midst of debauchery.