Forged

by Benedict Jacka

  I looked down and saw that the blood had stopped spreading. “Why? You’ve never liked her.”

  “Hey, don’t make it sound like it was my fault,” Anne said. “She hated me from the first time we met. Tried to hide it with that I’m-an-impartial-Keeper act, but I could tell. And that was before she suffocated me.”

  “Why the act of mercy then?” I asked. “Also, where’s Barrayar?”

  For answer, Anne clicked her fingers. Four of the summoned jann stalked in from the entrance hall. One of them was carrying Barrayar in its claws, the mage’s head and arms hanging limp. I scanned ahead and saw that Barrayar was alive but unconscious.

  I looked at Anne, eyes narrowed.

  “What?” Anne asked innocently.

  “What are you up to?”

  “Me?”

  Two of the jann stalked past, their eyes resting on me coldly as they passed. They bent down and picked Caldera up, shifting under her weight. “You’re taking prisoners now?” I said. “Why?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “You telling me that is a very good reason to worry about it.”

  “Oh, relax,” Anne said. “People are more useful alive than dead, right? Seems like the sort of thing you’d say.” The jann turned and began moving in the direction of the entrance hall, leaving us behind. “Anyway, this is where I get off.”

  “What?”

  “I’m done here. You have fun with Levistus.”

  “The whole reason I brought you here was because of Levistus!”

  “And that’s my problem how?” Anne gestured to the entrance hall. “Look, I took out most of his private army, plus a mantis golem, plus Barrayar. Oh, and that other mage. What was his name again? Ilmarin? No, that was some other guy.” Anne frowned, thinking, then shrugged. “Well, not like it matters. Anyway, I’m sure you can finish up on your own.”

  “While you do what, take a tea break?”

  “Hey, I’m not your bodyguard anymore.” Anne turned and walked away after the jann. “You’ll be fine. Good luck!”

  I stared after Anne’s retreating back. She didn’t turn to look at me, and I very briefly considered going after her. But that wasn’t what I’d come here to do.

  Anne disappeared, leaving me alone. From the look of the futures, I didn’t think she was coming back. I picked up my gun and walked forward.

  chapter 12

  The control centre under Levistus’s mansion was a wide, one-storey room, filled with desks and chairs. Computer equipment and magical focuses split the desktop space between them. The floor was polished and squeaked under my shoes, a grid of lights shone from above, and the hum of machinery was a steady noise in the background.

  The room was empty, but it didn’t feel deserted. Someone had been here only minutes ago. I had the feeling I knew who.

  The MP7 was back in my hands, the dispel focus back in my pocket. I channelled a steady thread of power into the focus, letting it recharge as I strode down between the desks. Banks of security monitors displayed CCTV images of the mansion, the swimming pool, the gate room. A projection focus sat dark and inactive, but I could sense a fading charge. A moment’s study told me that it had been set to view the entrance hall in the basement. Someone had stood here watching the battle. I could almost smell Levistus’s scent, trace his footprints.

  A space magic signature at the back of the room caught my attention. I moved closer.

  There was a freestanding gate against the back wall, a dark wood arch seven feet tall carved in intricate patterns. Like the projection focus, it held a fading magical residue. It had been deactivated, but it was locked, not burned out. A quick search revealed a password and a small override focus hidden in the wall. I said the password, touched the focus, and felt the gate stir to life. I’d only need to channel a little energy and I could step through. It would lead me into . . .

  I frowned. A ruin? Why would Levistus have a permanent gate to an empty ruin?

  I focused with my magesight, checking futures. As I studied the lines of the gate spell, I noticed inconsistencies. This wasn’t the destination that the gate had been originally set to. It had been altered recently, and the changes concealed. A misdirection.

  There was no way to tell where the gate had originally led, but the gate focus had been used for a very long time to go to the same place over and over again, and the focus “remembered” that destination, just as a book will fall open to a frequently read page. I reached out with the fateweaver to see if there was any chance that the gate would slip back to its original target. There was, but it was a very, very small chance.

  A moment’s work with the fateweaver and it was a one hundred percent chance. I touched the gate and channelled. Energy flowed; the lines of the spell shifted, and the archway darkened into a masked portal.

  I knew as soon as I stepped through that I’d found Levistus’s shadow realm.

  Columns of crystal and frosted glass spiralled to a pale blue ceiling, circular walls framing a large rounded room. Pedestals and standing shelves held magic items of all kinds, radiating dozens of overlapping magical auras. The shadow realm felt small, probably reaching barely further than the walls of the room.

  Levistus was bent over a desk, concentrating on something. As I stepped through he whirled, with an expression as close to shock as I’d ever seen on his face.

  It had been six years since I first met Levistus, and he’d changed very little. Thinning white hair, odd colourless eyes set in a face smoothed to stillness. “You!” he said. “How did . . . ?”

  “Your gate protections aren’t as good as you think,” I told him.

  Levistus’s expression calmed, returning to the masklike, impassive look that I remembered from all those Council meetings. “So I see,” he said. “I take it Caldera is dead?”

  “Do you care?”

  “I had imagined you might.”

  I began walking, circling Levistus. He turned to face me as I moved. “You know, I was expecting you to be there for the big fight,” I told him. “Not that I’m complaining. If I’d had to deal with you throwing mental attacks at the same time as I fought that mantis golem, I might actually have been in trouble.”

  “A leader’s role is to direct, not fight in the trenches,” Levistus said. “A lesson your time on the Council apparently failed to teach you.”

  “Well, when it comes to staying off the front lines, you’re certainly the expert. And you’re right. Maybe if I’d spent less time leading raids and more time building up political power, the way you did, I wouldn’t be here now. But then again, leading from the front teaches you things. Like how to win a battle.”

  “Win?” Levistus said. “You believe you’ve won?”

  I’d circled half the room, passing focuses and weapons and scrying items. I’d drifted closer as I moved: I’d started maybe fifty feet away from Levistus, and now the distance was down to more like forty. “Not yet.”

  Levistus didn’t answer.

  “I assume you know why I’m here.”

  “Yes, Verus, I know precisely why you are here,” Levistus said. “Once a Dark mage, always a Dark mage. Crude, destructive, and ultimately predictable.”

  “Yeah, that was what you thought back when you picked me to be your disposable diviner to get the fateweaver for you,” I said. “Has it ever occurred to you that the whole reason I was drawn into Council politics was because of you? If you hadn’t spent so long trying to destroy me, I wouldn’t have become the person I am right now. It’s funny, but in a way, you kind of created me.”

  “I had no part in creating you,” Levistus said sharply. “Your path was set by your master a long time ago.”

  I gave a slight smile. “Touched a nerve? I hope so, Levistus, because I really want to make sure you understand just how much of this is your own fault. Don’t get me wrong: the fact that I�
�m going to kill you in a few minutes is one hundred percent my decision, but you had so many chances to stop this. Back when we first met in Canary Wharf, do you have any idea just how little I cared about Light politics? Yes, I didn’t like the Council, but I really didn’t give two shits about who was on the Council. You were the one who changed that. First you tried to use me to steal the fateweaver, then you tried to have me assassinated when I got involved with Belthas, then you pointed the Nightstalkers in my direction the year after . . . I don’t think a year’s gone by when you haven’t tried to murder me or someone I care about. You know the worst thing? How pointless it all was. At any time, all you had to do was walk away. You could have stopped it after that failed death sentence; you could have stopped it after I was raised to the Council. Even right up until this week, I was still willing to call a truce. But you just couldn’t let it go.”

  Levistus’s eyes flashed. I’d sat at the same table as him for scores of Council meetings, maybe hundreds, but I think this was the first time I’d ever seen him openly angry. “You think this is some sort of grudge?” Even furious, Levistus’s voice was tight and controlled. “Your arrogance is beyond belief. I sought your removal because I recognised from the very beginning that your influence upon the Council would be a purely destructive one. Bahamus and Druss were both foolish enough to believe that you could be manipulated. I was not. You care nothing for order, nothing for stability. Your only concern is for yourself. Your presence on the Council was an insult to everything it stands for.”

  “And what does it stand for?” I asked. “See, that’s the thing about Light mages like you and Caldera and Talisid. You love to talk about these high-minded ideals that the Council supposedly stands for, and you think that makes you so much better than Dark mages. But you never seem to feel any particular need to act better than Dark mages. You love to talk about how evil your enemies are, but when you’re the ones doing the destroying or lying or killing, you never seem to have a problem with it.”

  Levistus looked at me in contempt. “Like most Dark mages, you have the intellectual development of a child.”

  “Yeah, well, children can still see the obvious,” I said. “You want to lecture me about only caring about myself? How many lives have you destroyed to get to where you are now, Levistus? Oh, I’m sure you don’t kill them personally. You just sit in your comfortable chair and sign orders with your fountain pen. Have you ever bothered to count? I don’t think you have. They’re just numbers on a page.”

  “Your feelings are irrelevant,” Levistus said. “As are your infantile ethics.”

  “You know the other thing about people like you?” I said. “You get cocky. You order people’s deaths, and because you’re not the one who has to get your hands dirty, you avoid the consequences. After a while, you stop thinking about consequences at all. You figure you’re untouchable, and for the most part, you’re right. And so when you finally go too far, it takes you a long time to notice. You know what it was in your case, that knocked down the whole house of cards? It was when you and Sal Sarque ordered for Anne to be captured and tortured two years ago. Back then, I doubt either of you gave it a second thought. But it gave Anne the push to pick up the jinn, and if you follow that chain of events all the way through, it ends up with Anne killing Sal Sarque in his island fortress a month back.”

  I’d closed the distance to thirty feet. A few more steps and I’d be in range to rush him. “You really do not see it, do you?” Levistus said. “Sal Sarque’s death at your hands demonstrates precisely why you and Mage Walker needed to be removed.”

  “Anne killed Sarque because of what you did.”

  “She killed Sarque because she valued her self-preservation over the good of the country,” Levistus said. “As do you. Consider, Verus. Let us say that you succeed, that you and Mage Walker manage to overthrow the Council, kill enough of them to cause their resistance to collapse. Will it be worth it? When historians look back, what do you think their judgement will be? Are your lives worth more than this country?”

  I was silent.

  “You never even considered it,” Levistus said. “And that is why you are unfit to wield power.”

  “Did you expect us to lie down and die?”

  “Of course not. If you valued the good of the country over yourself, you would have. But you do not, and you did not, and instead you chose the vicious and destructive path you follow now.”

  I stared into Levistus’s colourless eyes for a moment. “You know, people like you are always talking about sacrifices and the greater good,” I said. “But there’s a funny thing I’ve noticed. No matter how many people get sacrificed, you’re never one of them.”

  Levistus looked back at me indifferently. “And?”

  “I think maybe it’s your turn.”

  I started my lunge on the last word, but Levistus was ready. Ice flashed across the room, running from wall to wall and from floor to ceiling.

  I came to a stop. The wall of ice split the room in half, with me on one side and Levistus on the other. It was transparent, and nearly a foot thick. I know what ice mages are capable of, and even the strongest of them can’t throw up walls that big that fast. Levistus must have had some item or trick.

  “I’d heard rumours that you were an elementalist as well as a mind mage,” I said. “Should have guessed ice would be your style.”

  “The key words,” Levistus said, “are as well.”

  Mental force struck me like a hammer. It wasn’t anything like the domination attempts I’d faced from Crystal and Abithriax: this was a brute-force attack designed to stun the target, crush their mind and leave them unconscious. But just as Levistus had anticipated my move, I’d anticipated his. I’d been channelling my power through the mind shield I carried, and Levistus’s attack ran into my mental defences.

  Levistus struck again and again. The ice was no barrier to him, and he hammered my defences with blows of psychic force. It felt like a boxer pounding against my guard, fists slamming into my brain. But I’d had years of practice at defending myself against psychic combat, and the focus was the best I’d been able to find. Waves of hostile energy crashed against my mind, breaking against the fortress of my will.

  I forced myself to ignore the mental blows and focused on the ice wall. It was thick and strong, but it was real ice, with the weaknesses that came with it. I focused on vulnerable points, using the fateweaver to amplify them, then I lifted my MP7, clicked it to single-shot, and began firing, slowly and deliberately, one bullet per second. The flat report of the gun echoed in the chamber, my divination guiding each bullet as it slammed into the ice.

  “If you expect to shoot through—” Levistus began.

  My fifth bullet hit, and there was a rumbling crunch. Cracks spiderwebbed through the wall and Levistus stopped talking.

  I fired a sixth bullet, and a seventh.

  Levistus made a gesture and the air next to him shimmered. A humanoid figure took form, visible only to my magesight, floating just above and beside him, sculpted out of lines of vapour. It was an air elemental like Starbreeze, but where Starbreeze’s face was expressive and ever-changing, this one’s face was blank.

  “It took me some time to replace Thirteen,” Levistus said. “The changes proved more complex than predicted. Still, I suppose this is as good a time as any for a field test. I think you’ll find it quite effective at its purpose.”

  I kept firing. Eight shots, nine. There was another rumble and a section of wall five feet up cracked and fell.

  Levistus twitched his hand.

  The elemental soared up, quick as lightning, darting through the hole I’d made, then curving down. Those eerie blank eyes were locked on my face as it dove towards me. Air elementals don’t need to strike or buffet their targets; they can turn a living being to air and scatter them across a thousand miles. This one wasn’t intending to do that—some limita
tion of whatever Levistus had done to enslave it, maybe. It was going to try to flow straight down my throat and asphyxiate me. Just as fatal.

  I’d pulled the wand from my belt the instant the elemental began moving. As it went into its dive, I fired.

  Red light flashed out, carrying the scent of ozone. The elemental tried to dodge aside, but somehow, despite its speed, the beam caught it in the head. In my magesight I saw the beam tear through the core of animating magic within the creature and burn through the other end. The elemental wisped into vapour, destroyed in an instant.

  Weakness rippled through me, and I lowered the wand, meeting Levistus’s eyes. “Not effective enough,” I told him.

  Levistus’s face twisted in anger, but I was already firing. The final bullet sent a shock wave along the ice wall’s major fracture and split it open. With a keening crash, a whole section of the ice wall from floor to ceiling collapsed.

  Levistus tried to throw up a smaller wall of ice to block the hole. I broke into a run, firing from the hip, twisting the futures as I did. The bullets intercepted the ice as it formed, shattered it before the structure could take shape, and then I was through, with nothing between me and Levistus but empty floor.

  Levistus snapped a command word. From one of the pedestals, something metal unfurled and leapt towards me. I dived and rolled, catching a glimpse of the thing as it flew overhead: a black metal chain, hooked and barbed and glowing with red light. Instead of falling, the thing arrested its forward motion, then reversed course, accelerating back towards me.

  In the moment’s breathing space I dropped the MP7 and drew my dispel focus. As the chain enveloped me, I stepped in and struck. The chain was some sort of enormously powerful focus item, animated with a simple governing intelligence, and it was shielded against dispel magic. The fateweaver found a chink in the protections, and the dispel attack caused the focus spells to go wild and fail. Metal barbs lashed my back, but they were already lifeless and falling away. The chain clattered to the floor.