The magus was not a patient man, and he harboured no desire to engage in a staring contest with a dozen piles of rock. “G’day” he said. “I’m, uh, looking for the Queen of the Mountains.”
“That is where we are taking you.” He could not tell which of the quartz warriors was speaking, for its voice was like sheetrock cracking, and seemed to come from all sides. Perhaps the mountain itself was addressing him. “After your audience, you will be taken to the gaol, where you will reside with those others who have trespassed upon our sovereign territory, and there you will remain until your mortal span is ended.”
“Steady on,” said the magus. “All I wanted was to borrow a cup of sugar.”
At spear-point, the quartz warriors marched the magus and the dog-man up a treacherous slope, along a series of precipitous ledges, and then down into a dark, jagged opening. The magus was certain that the path had not been there before the quartz warriors had appeared.
They went down unlit tunnels too narrow for them to stand abreast. They navigated a rickety suspension bridge that swayed wildly beneath their weight. They marched through cavernous, marbled antechambers and up a grand staircase; through a series of increasingly large vestibules and atriums; and finally, they were delivered into the enormous chamber where the Queen of the Mountains held court.
The ceiling of the throne-room was conical, so the magus reckoned they were near the top of the mountain. He found the idea that a mountain might be hollow disturbing.
Courtiers and politicians milled about, as in any court, gossiping and intriguing amongst themselves. Orderly rows of stalactites and stalagmites gave the vertiginous impression of soldiers standing at parade rest along both the ceiling and the floor. A double-row of them guarded the path to the throne.
The light was poor, so the magus shifted the spectrum of his vision downwards. In infrared, the stony mountain folk were surprisingly bright. Perhaps they had molten cores, like volcanoes or planets. He wondered if their spilled blood would crystallize into igneous rock.
The Queen of the Mountains sat rigid and unmoving upon her throne. Her pale dress pooled around her like cooling lava; her dark grey skin gleamed with the texture of polished slate. Shards of leucite protruded from her skull in a manner suggestive of hair.
A cluster of foreign dignitaries stood around the foot of the queen’s massive throne, engaged in what seemed to be a heated discussion. The quartz warriors stopped well short of the throne: they would not interrupt their Queen’s diplomatic business with something as trifling as a pair of trespassers.
“If the Ore Queen will not provide us with soldiers she must at least provide steel to arm our forces,” the Queen of the Mountains demanded. She spoke slowly and deeply, like a glacier grinding against a cliff.
“Nay, Majesty,” replied the dignitary to whom the queen had spoken: a broad-shouldered being clad in raiment of finely woven metals. “Your foe is a friend to the Ore-lands, and my liege will not give you materials with which to fight him without payment.”
A being garbed in dark robes spoke up. Its voice was calm and soft and so deep that it resonated oddly inside the magus’ skull. Its face was completely concealed inside its hood. “The Council of the Magi requires Ore-lands steel to manufacture the shadow weapons. No other source will provide metal of the required quality.”
A dignitary dressed in a cloak woven from living foliage jabbed a finger angrily. “Our foe is equipped with terrible mortal arms; we cannot wage this war without shadowsteel. The Tree Queen will not stand for this.”
“Then the Tree Queen must sit her throne for all her days to come,” replied the emissary from the Ore-lands. “My Queen will not help you to make war upon her friends.”
The Queen of the Mountains again spoke. “This mortal abomination encroaches upon the Ore-Lands, as he does upon the forests and our own mountains. Surely the Ore Queen would profit from his destruction?”
“The land he occupies has already been mined clean,” said the Ore-lands’ emissary. “He is a peaceable neighbour and a reliable customer.”
“Peaceable?” shrilled the emissary of the Tree Queen. “He has enslaved the entire Tinker nation.”
“The Tinkers were squatting in our territories long before the mortal ever came along,” said the Ore-lands’ emissary. “As I recall, the Tree Queen was hardly a friend to them, either.”
“They were good, honest faerie folk—”
“And the Tree Queen did her very best to exterminate them,” said the Ore-lands’ emissary. “That is how this mortal came to rule them in the first place.”
“Yet faerie folk they were. Now, they are—”
“The Queen of the Ore-Lands considers that the mortal has greatly improved the Tinkers.”
The magus stepped between a pair of quartz guards and elbowed his way through the courtiers and diplomats. “Ey, Queenie,” he said. “Queenie. I got a proposition for you.”
The Queen of the Mountains tipped her head back, the better to look down her nose at the magus. Her neck cracked visibly as she did so, though the fractures sealed themselves as soon her head was in its new position. “And who is this impudent beast, to address us so?”
“I’m the Grinch that fucked Christmas,” said the magus. “I’m looking for this mortal, same as you are. Tell me where I can find him and I’ll take care of him for you.”
“The mortal is most powerful,” said the Tree Queen’s emissary. “We are assembling an army. What makes you think that you can defeat him by yourself?”
“Well, I’m not a fucken elf who lives down a fucking rabbit hole or up a goddamn tree. I’m a mortal, too—I know how to deal with his tricks and his toys.”
“I do not believe that you know anything,” said the Tree Queen’s emissary.
“I know his name,” said the magus. “Do you?”
The robed figure turned its cowl towards him. It raised its hands, which were covered with scars and burns, and the magus felt it drawing magic about itself.
The magus opened his mouth, but his words froze on his tongue. The spells he had palmed slipped between his fingers like sand through the tines of a fork, and the runes he imagined broke apart, unquickened.
The dog-man drew its cutlass and leapt snarling to his aid, but its blade had no effect on the warriors’ rocky hides. They subdued it easily. The magus was too stunned to give any fight. The quartz warriors did not need to restrain him while they divested him of the considerable number of weapons he carried upon his person.
“What manner of beast are you?” demanded the Queen of the Mountains, when the magus had recovered his senses.
“The worst kind,” said the magus, unable to turn his face towards her because a quartz warrior was kneeling on his head. “A human.”
“He is as he claims, your Majesty,” said the cowled figure. “He is a mortal, like the one we seek to destroy.”
“Is he now, Councillor?”
“Indeed. He is a magus of no mean skill, and a practitioner of the vilest of arts. He is a necromancer. He traffics with demons.”
“Can he be trusted?”
“No, your Majesty. His crimes against the faerie folk are numerous already. If he remains free to travel the Realms I cannot divine how great the consequent destruction will be.”
“You forgot to say about me heart of gold,” said the magus.
“Take this beast from our presence,” said the Queen of the Mountains. “At dawn, he will be lowered into the canyons. We will personally supervise the mountains as they grind his meat from his bones.”
A quartz warrior struck a blow to the magus’ head, and his senses fled once more.
9. Gaol
The magus awoke in a cell that was six feet deep, three feet wide and five feet high. The walls were cut from stone that had been polished as smooth as glass. He sat up and felt the bruises on the back of
his head. The magus winced, grunted and pushed his hair from his eyes. He’d been in jail before, and did not enjoy the experience.
The dog-man assumed its human form when it saw that he was awake. It drew its knees to its chest and looked at him with sympathy. “Are you intact?”
“I’ve suffered worse from a slab of beer.”
“That must be a formidable foe,” said the dog-man.
“Not as formidable as you’d hope,” said the magus, leaning back against a wall. “Tell me: who’s the bastard in the hood?”
“He serves the Council of the Magi,” said the dog-man.
“The Council of the Magi?”
“They govern the use of magic throughout all the Realms of the Land.”
“I know the kind,” said the magus.
“The thirteen who comprise the council are of many kinds,” said the dog-man. “Folk from all over the Realms, from every nation and territory and species.”
“All the most boring assholes from throughout the Land in one boring fucken place,” said the magus. “I’d rather be in jail.”
He rose and went to inspect the bars that sealed him inside the cell. They were made of black steel, and they went into the stone of the floor and ceiling without any seams or joins. They were too narrowly spaced for the dog-man to pass through, even in its diminished, canine form.
The magus took the bars in his fists, but found that he could not channel any power. The Councillor had set an enchantment upon him that would not allow him to build any spells. He could perceive the construct that constrained his abilities—dimly—but that was all that remained to him of his art.
The magus let go of the bars and retreated back into the cell.
“Dog,” said the magus, considering, “When you change shape, you also change size. Right?”
“Aye,” said the dog-man.
“Do you have to?”
The dog-man looked at him quizzically. “Aye, for a dog is smaller than a man.”
“Well, yes, but…can you shift your mass without changing your shape?”
“No,” it said. “I cannot.”
The magus rubbed the bridge of his nose. Lank blonde hair fell across his shadowed eyes. “Become a dog again.”
The dog-man complied, unquestioning.
“Now,” said the magus, “Become a man, but maintain your current mass size.”
The two-foot tall dog-man grinned at him in its human form.
“How old are you, dog?”
“I have no way of reckoning that would be meaningful in mortal terms.”
“Oh,” said the magus, disappointed that he had lost the opportunity to cite a cliché. The dog-man just stared at him blankly.
“Now,” said the magus, “Go find that motherfucker in the black robe and fetch me his spleen.”
Tail wagging, the dog-man slid between the bars. It set off down the corridor at a lope, becoming a terrier the size of a bullock in four strides.
Before long, the magus felt his sorcerous perceptions sharpening. The spell that restrained his magic loosened, and the magus brushed it away like cobwebs from an old suit of clothes. He rose and went straight to the shadowsteel bars that kept him inside the cell. No amount of heat would soften them; no force would bend them; but the rock walls that held them in place gave no such resistance. The magus cracked the bars right out of the walls and stepped out into the corridor.
As he walked through the halls, he found the corpses of the wardens, savagely mauled or smashed to rubble. “Good dog,” he said.
The magus drew a pair of summoning circles on the glass-smooth floor, using the plentiful supply of fresh blood to mark them out. He worked with care, because the things he intended to summon into them were as terrible as he could reckon—and that was terrible indeed.
In the first circle he raised a demon that was twenty feet tall and possessed of far too many limbs. It had no joints, but rather was strung together with spools of razor wire. Into the second circle he conjured a demon that looked like an ordinary human man, only covered with hundreds of functioning eyes. The sockets in its skull lay empty.
To the first demon, the magus said: “Find the court of the Tree Queen and kill everyone you see. The Queen, the King, every nob and general and minister and courtier. All of them. Report back to me when you’re done.”
“Sure thing,” said the disconnected demon. The magus scuffed a gap in its containing circle and it set off with a jouncing gait. It jumped through a stone wall and vanished, leaving only a pattern of soot-stains to mark its passing.
To the second demon, the magus said: “The Queen of the Mountains and her lot are yours.” He paused a moment. “Make sure you don’t hurt me dog.”
“Whatever you say, brother,” said the eye demon. When the magus broke its circle the demon sauntered off down the corridor, whistling one of the magus’ favourite songs.
The magus slapped together a teleportation spell and vanished in a gasp of sulphur and smoke. He rematerialized in the foothills below the mountains amidst a similar cloud, about two feet above the ground. He fell and turned an ankle.
“Fuck goddamn shit,” he swore, though he knew he had been lucky: two feet below the ground would have had far worse consequences. He stood up, spat, and limped away to pitch camp.
10. Beer and Spleen
When he had erected the tent, the magus started a fire and drew a six-pack of German beer out of the foldspace repository he used for an arsenal and a larder. His thirst was such that he drank the first bottle warm. Sated, he tried to figure out a spell to chill the rest of the beers to a more acceptable temperature, but succeeded only in exploding three of the pressurized bottles.
While the magus drank beer by his fire, the eye demon wandered through the halls of the Mountain Queen, harvesting the eyes of every creature it looked upon and collecting them in a pink leather bag. It wandered through the ballrooms and the halls of parliament and the throne room. It wandered through the kitchens and the barracks and the sculleries and the courthouse. Every blinded victim watched itself die from the thousand viewpoints fixed upon the demon’s hide. None were spared, for there was no place to hide from a demon with eyes enough to see all that could be seen, and with empty sockets that perceived all that could not.
By and by the dog-man came trotting to the magus’ campsite in its terrier form, at its habitual size. It bore its huge cutlass in its teeth, wound about with the intestines of the emissary of the Council of the Magi. Most of the emissary’s digestive system trailed behind it in the dirt.
The terrier deposited the cutlass at the magus’ feet and resumed its bipedal form. “My apologies,” it said. “I was not able to determine which of its organs you might consider its spleen.”
“So, you brought them all?”
“Aye.”
The magus laughed and slapped the dog-man on the back and said that it could keep the Councillor’s innards for itself. The dog-man made a happy noise that was as much laugh as it was a growl and a bark. It cut a spit from a nearby tree and sat down to roast the dirt-caked offal at the magus’ fire. The magus declined to share in its meal, claiming that he could subsist on beer alone.
When the eye demon manifested, the dog-man whined and crept behind its master. The demon clasped its orb-encysted hands and bowed. “All dead,” it said.
“The Queen of the Mountains and her entire court?”
“There are a few platoons of her soldiers wandering around the slopes, but they’re all that’s left.” It smiled. There were eyes on its teeth and tongue. “Guess I got a bit carried away.”
“Ta, mate,” said the magus. The demon bowed again and slung the pink leather bag across its back. The magus dismissed it with a wave of his hand.
Hours passed, but the severed-limb demon did not return. The magus stirred the embers of the fire with the toe of
a boot and bent to peer into them. He grunted, spat, then finally stood up and swore. Divination was not his strongest magic; he was much better at demons and fire and death. The magus kicked an empty beer bottle into the smoking ashes and smashed it with the heel of his boot. That seemed to do the trick: now, he could indeed see into the Realm of the Tree Queen.
The forests of the Faerie Realms had long been infested with demons and monsters—just as they had been in his own world, in the days when it had lain closer to the Land. The Tree Queen had suffered many such attacks before, and she had her own coven of magi who protected her with wards and spells and traps. They had captured and bound his wire demon before it could wreak any harm upon them.
The magus grunted and swept the ashes away. His destruction of the Mountain Queen would suffice in delaying the action against the one he sought. This other mortal, who had brought science to the Land of the Faerie. The Tree Queen did not herself interest the magus.
He called the dog-man over. “The bloke we’re lookin’ for lives where the forests, the mountains and the Ore-Lands have a common border. You know where that is?”
“I can find it,” said the dog-man.
11. The Machine
City
The Machine City erupted from the side of the mountain like a cancer. A great river had been choked into a canal system to feed its growth upon those blighted slopes.
Prefabricated outposts dotted the arid sand flats that had once belonged to the Ore-lands, spreading into a clear-cut area that the magus supposed had once belonged to the Tree Queen. Metal vehicles that looked like APCs and tanks crawled across the terrain closer to the command citadel, weaving amongst trenches and pillboxes. Ornithopters buzzed lethargically through the polluted skies, pregnant with bombs, missiles and other, stranger munitions.
“Is this what the mortal world is like?” asked the dog-man.
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