by Kim Wedlock
"Well for once I think he's wrong," a statement to which Eyila nodded her agreement. "But it is having a dire effect on them rather than just turning benign like any other degraded spell would. But the difference between these spells and any other is that these didn't necessarily degrade, but their subject did - and if that subject was a conjured...chair, for example, then should that chair spell degrade but an overlaying one for comfort not, that overlaying spell would be without a subject."
"And it's replacing the subject with the closest thing to itself..." Anthis nodded slowly. "Eizariin said something similar..."
"But why haven't they degraded?"
"They have - the effects they're having were never what they were intended to. But that whole place was made of magic, so everything in there would have been wrapped in preservation spells to make sure it held together, and they, by design, are supposed to last. These spells are just small fragments of larger spells that have retained just enough information to still function. Like if you were to tear a letter into pieces, you could have one piece with just two lines on it, but those two lines would still be legible and possibly still make sense even without the rest of it.
"Most of the surviving chains are benign - I think there are only two or three in any one place having an effect. But those, crucially, are more or less complete. And if one of them latches onto just the right thing, it could easily result in...well, everything it already has, and more besides. A spell for, say, warmth, could attach itself to a patch of forest and it will just get a little warmer than the surroundings. But if that spell attached itself to somewhere already warm - like a patch in the desert - it could be much more drastic. That patch would heat up much more quickly than the rest, then rise quicker than the rest, cool quicker--"
"And a great wind would be born. And moisture would be burned away and rise into rain clouds, while the cool air that moved down in place of the rising heat would heat up itself, rise itself, and more cool air would sweep in beneath it while yet more clouds form." Eyila's eyes were chilling.
"And if the spell had lost its temperature regulation, the cycle could repeat itself very, very quickly." Rathen sighed. "The results aren't something the world was ever prepared for. Even the chains of beauty have played a part. Loggerhead came to a standstill when everyone became entranced, didn't it?"
"I didn't realise it was so complicated," Petra frowned. Her hand shifted to rest upon the hilt of her sword as if it could offer some solution to an intangible problem. She looked across Rathen and Eyila, then to Garon, who appeared just as pensive. "It's getting worse, too, isn't it? Khry's Glory has been closed off but magic is still gathering and 'latching' onto things."
"Mmm...I'm just speculating now, but I think some might even be feeding off of each other. Chains with just the right remnants to compliment one another and form a more complete spell, and some of those may be enhancing existing spells. It would also explain why spells cast nearby exacerbates the situation..." He glanced up from the paper and across the dubious expressions. He smiled regretfully and folded it away. "But I could be wrong. It could just be slower-moving spells. Either way: as Petra said, Khry's Glory is closed. There's nothing new to come out of that accursed place. And I'll give Owan all I know, and find out whatever more I can...though...that may be easier said than done..."
"Why?"
"Because under that magic I can't--b-because, the Zi'veyn, I'll have to do it before using it or there will be nothing left to see. It will take longer..."
"What do you think he intends to do with the information?"
Rathen gave Garon a flat look. "Nothing as sinister as what's going through your mind, Inquisitor. He's just trying to do his bit, as we are. He's never been one to sit still and responsibility has hung over him just as strongly as it has me. He just chose a different direction to chase it."
"Yes. And he also wants to know if we have anything to do with the absence of magic in Wrenroot and Borer's Teeth." The officer's eyes darkened. Rathen straightened and matched it.
"Because he wants a solution as much as we do."
"I hate to feed Garon's paranoia," said Petra, "but we shouldn't tell him. Anything we can avoid falling into Salus's hands - this bird came by an official channel, he's probably monitoring them. We can't risk it."
"I know - so I'll tell him only what he needs to know. Which is nothing to do with the Zi'veyn."
Aria's eyes narrowed at the note of disappointment in his tone and the rounding of his shoulders as he tucked the note into his sleeve - a point that Anthis, too, didn't miss. But when the historian noticed Garon's gaze come to rest upon him, he was torn between standing tall in personal defence as Rathen had, or shrinking back under the pressure. His inability to do the first irritated him.
"Did you find anything in Attleton?"
"Like what?"
"News. Information."
"Would he have noticed a thing in that state?"
"Whether I would or not, I didn't," he replied shortly, though Petra hadn't spoken unkindly. "Did you, Inquisitor?"
"No," he sighed resentfully, "refugees don't really have access to current news. We'll have to wait for Mokhan, we're certain to find something there. We'll move on north in the morning."
"Actually," Anthis stepped forwards while the inquisitor turned to begin his patrol, despite Rathen returning to the fire and removing the lid from the fragrant pot, "Banmar Dells isn't far out of our way. We might do well to swing south for an hour or so first, take a look at the magic there."
But Garon was already shaking his head. "We can't linger. Kulokhar is only two days' ride away. It's too close."
"And it will still be two days' ride away from Mokhan," Rathen said as Aria handed him the first bowl to serve the steaming stew, which he'd privately decided was absurd given the warmth of the evening. "The difference is that Banmar isn't a city, and removing the magic is the only reason we came out here to begin with. And, as it seems that I now have even more to do, I agree with Anthis."
"As do I," Petra declared, and the rest nodded their concurrence.
The inquisitor's face darkened, upon her in particular, but, and much to everyone's surprise, he didn't offer any argument. Instead, with a sharp snarl of irritation, he snapped away and trudged back up above the ravine.
"What will the ruin be like?" Aria asked Anthis, twirling towards him with eyes almost aglow in excitement while the rest shook their heads at the inquisitor's see-sawing priorities. But the glum look he gave her as he took the bowl she handed him quietened that enthusiasm. She sighed heavily in disappointment. "It's just a few rocks again, isn't it?"
"It's barely even that."
"You sound disappointed yourself," Petra observed.
"Because it's little more than a large flat stone with weather-beaten carvings. And it's been studied to death."
"Well, it's just as well we're not here to study."
"And that means we should be bored?"
Eyila chuckled as she sat down beside him, at which he shuffled, smiled and immediately turned red. Rathen caught Petra's wrist as she instinctively moved to separate them.
The following morning, as they rode south through the warm, open fields, all eyes surveyed closely across the sparse and slender trees. There was no movement but for a distant herd of fallow deer and the flying to and fro of birds catching insects on the wing. But their exposure set a fire behind them, and even Eyila found herself missing the concealment of the forests.
But as Petra scanned the east from the rear of the company and noticed, purely by chance, the split stump of an ancient tree and the single limb that pointed along their heading, she suddenly realised the significance of that 'large flat stone'. She looked ahead to Anthis, who peered around with the same vigilance as the rest. "The stone - is that--"
"Rowan's Repentance." He looked back in surprise. "Yes, it is. You hadn't guessed?"
Aria frowned with curiosity between the two of them. "What is Rowan's Rip-rep--"
"Repentance - it's a Craitic parable about a thief who was punished by Vastal and chose this spot to ask for Her forgiveness."
"Would you please tell it?" Eyila also looked around with a quiet light of interest, which stalled Anthis's tongue. So Petra took over.
"It starts with a very dry summer. A fire spread through farmland, destroying a whole village's food and livelihood, and one man blamed the Goddess and strayed from the Temple in protest. For a month, he stole food and lied to try to get by, but things only got worse for him. One day, after he stole five loaves of bread that a baker had made for Communion at the Temple, he fled through the village and twisted his ankle on the dais of the Goddess's statue. In that moment, as he looked up at the statue, he realised that he was being punished. His initial misfortune had come from a fire that had burned the fields that the whole village had relied upon for food and work, but while they'd helped one another and rebuilt from the ashes, and their fields had become more fertile and crops more bountiful for it, only that one man had turned to crime and selfishness and preyed upon the people around him, all of whom were under just as much pressure to provide as he was.
"For nights he couldn't sleep, he was so plagued by nightmares, so he came out here, stood upon a large stone and remained there for twenty two days and nights to repent to the Goddess, one for every theft."
But Aria's face had slowly screwed up into a tight little knot, and she turned towards her father. "That doesn't make any sense. Why did he do that instead of apologising to the people he stole from and trying to make things right with them?"
"Because," he replied lightly, "some people feel the need to do things in a more round about sort of way."
"And what happened?" Eyila asked, riveted.
"Vastal spoke to him."
"He hadn't eaten or slept in three weeks," Rathen mumbled with a roll of his eyes. "I'm surprised a roaming deer didn't speak to him. Or a giant wedge of cheese."
Aria giggled, until another abrupt and pensive knot twisted her face again. "Daddy, wouldn't it take longer than a month for the fields to grow back?"
"We have a similar story."
Anthis looked up. "You do?"
Eyila nodded and cast him a wonderful smile. "About a priestess named Oluu'a. She'd been in Aya'u's grace for seven years but felt that her connection to the Goddess was waning. Unlike the younger priestesses, when she meditated she heard nothing new on the winds. After three seasons, she began to believe that Aya'u had rejected her, so she climbed to the top of the highest butte in the centre of the Singing Sands and sat in meditation for half a moon to attain a greater connection with Her."
"And?"
"On the fifteenth night, she died."
"...Oh."
"Aya'u had taken her into Her wings. What she had mistaken as hearing nothing was actually perfect attunement. She was hearing constantly, but with nothing significant presenting itself, she hadn't noticed the ascension."
"You're sure it wasn't heatstroke?" Rathen cast Anthis an innocent look for the sharp nudge he'd received, but Eyila only smiled with the unwavering confidence of the faithful.
"Her m'yona amulet was gone. Her amulet and her spirit. All else remained as if in meditation."
"It could have been stolen."
"Yes - but it hadn't been. There were no footprints."
"The wind--" Anthis nudged him again, but still Eyila only smiled wider.
"The wind had been still that night. All but for evidence of a single brief whipping around where her body remained. The sand beyond was undisturbed, and there are too few qanats in that vast region for even a desperate or ambitious thief to risk the trek. Priestesses themselves rarely ventured so far."
But before Rathen could provide yet another possibility, Garon pulled his bay to a stop at the crest of the hill. The others drew up beside him and stared in equal surprise. Fog obscured the near distance, spanning the width of the shallow valley, penetrated only by the tops of trees. A chilling serenity reached out like ghostly fingers towards them, drawing them in with a deathly fascination. Instinct told them to turn away. But that was their route - and very likely their destination.
Garon urged his nervous mare onwards. With uneasy looks, the others did the same.
The edge of the magic hit half way down the slope. Rathen braced, but Eyila succumbed immediately, and the rest looked around in awe, their skittish horses moving tighter together. The fog seemed constantly out of reach, the hidden forest growing no closer despite every monotonous hoof beat, but the wisps had already encircled them, sneaking around to cut off their retreat and steal away their bearings. Soft patches of white light were the only fixed landmarks until they levelled with the first trees, but their origins were phantom, impossible either to see or guess at, while gentle tones of powder blue and lilac shifted about like glow flies. But all the while, their surroundings remained eternally bleak and grey.
Their skin soon began to prickle, goose-flesh spreading at a sudden chill that intensified as swiftly as a raging polar gale, and it took no one too long to notice that the land was not grey by fog alone. Unsettled glances rippled as the horses' hooves crunched on through crisp frost.
But Rathen had long projected himself beyond the confines of the ghostly web.
The fog had heralded magic; for the first time, he'd had warning, and the moment they'd passed the threshold he'd wasted no time in narrowing his focus into a search, probing the chains, their movements and anchors for anything he hadn't noticed before. But while he'd prepared against the swarming magic, it was merciless in asserting its dominance. Within moments, his armour began to thin.
Urgency redoubled his efforts. He could do nothing about the assault so far from the magnetism's centre without risking an oversight, and while concentration seemed increasingly impossible, his choices were limited: try, or succumb. Terror made the decision for him.
His mind surged onwards, tracing and retracing a haphazard path through every mark and detail, collecting and recollecting everything that stood out, anything of note. It wasn't long before discoveries began to diminish, but he didn't spare a moment to wonder at whether or not there was anything left to find, or if his focus had finally been exhausted. He didn't dare stop for a heartbeat.
It wasn't until a sudden pressure tightened around his arm that his desperate absorption finally shattered, but as his eyes bolted down to the cuff beneath the weave of his shirt, his heart burning in his throat, he found only Aria's hand and a quiet, worried look in her misty blue eyes. His relief was glancing. He spun in the saddle without even an assuaging smile, hurriedly fortifying his mind and noticing, at last, that they had come to a stop.
Then the magnetism tugged, and his eyes landed on Rowan's Repentance - and the figure seated upon the frosted ground behind it.
Each of them eyed the stubbled old man warily from their saddles, and the dark, official cloak he had wrapped himself in. No one was willing to approach the lone mage, ask him what he was doing, if he was all right; none would risk provoking or startling him. But neither could they leave him behind and move on. This was the spot; the magnetism always centred around structures like this altar. They'd all learned that much. But they were also sorely aware of just exactly what they were seeing.
And Rathen above all others.
Aria released her hold on his arm as he dismounted despite Garon's command, but the quietly snapped words didn't reach him. No one tried to pull him back. Everyone held their breath; hands hovered over sword hilts. Neither man nor mage reacted.
But for the slightest twitch of his lips, thoughts shaping on his breath, the man was deathly still. His aged and haunted eyes stared off for miles. There was a stark conflict within them. Confusion. Disappointment. Rathen saw it in a second even amongst his own struggles. Otherwise, they were empty. The man was completely unaware of his presence. And Rathen didn't announce himself - harried by his own alarm, he didn't think to say a word, but there would have been no use if he had. Trapped in her tra
nce, Eyila didn't respond even to being shaken, and this man was much farther gone.
He lifted the wrist that lay limp upon his knee. Again, Garon's command didn't register, and neither did the others' gasps of alarm. But the man didn't react either.
Rathen's magic immediately penetrated his skin, probing carefully into his veins, and he reined in his focus before it could spill on ahead in a maddened frenzy. He tripped a few times, but even in his torment he located quickly what he'd both feared and expected: a terrible heat, the engagement of a spell with no intention in place, magic moving in blood too cool to keep up - magic moving, but by the will of neither itself nor its host.
All identical to Eyila's ailments, but far more concentrated.
But there was nothing he could do even had aid occurred to him. In that moment, as he gathered the last, faint details, his own struggles crashed upon him as though the sky had collapsed.
He launched to his feet, dropping the man's hand before squeezing his own against the quivering of his bones, and hurried back to his horse to dive into the saddlebag, muttering feverishly as he rifled through.
Aria watched in distress from the saddle, and Garon appeared quietly beside them, casting the child a reassuring gesture while watching both mages intently. She gasped in fright as her father spun away, the glint in his hand revealing his prize, and dashed off with an urgency rivalled only by fleeing. He fell perfectly still when he reached the altar.
A charge set in the air. Quietly, Garon freed his sword from its sheath. Petra appeared beside him in equal vigilance. Anthis moved closer between Eyila and Aria, ready to grasp the reins should either's mount spook. No one was sure just what they expected to happen, but they had no doubt that something would.
As they strained, their ears began to pick out the faintest sounds - breath, mutters, the gurgle of a stomach - and their eyes found the branches of the nearest trees. The beechwood soon began to gather through the fog, drawing slowly closer, peering down upon them in interest. They stared back with caution. It took a long while before they realised that the cloud was receding, and that the frost beneath their feet had begun to thaw.