Scholar of Magic

by Michael G. Manning

  “My ancient home, the Shadowlands.”

  It was hard to see, as the air seemed to swirl around them in dark ribbons. Will thought there were trees, or bushes, but the light was dim, and everything seemed insubstantial. He tried adjusting his vision and only succeeded in making himself nauseous. The world only grew stranger the harder he tried to perceive it properly.

  The Cath Bawlg stopped suddenly, and Will probably would have fallen off if it hadn’t been for the climbing spell. Something even darker loomed in front of them, or perhaps it receded. Or is it sinking downward? His mind struggled to make sense of the alien geometries that seemed inherent to everything in the Shadowlands. “It’s time to use the demon-armor spell,” warned the goddamn cat.

  Will had formed the spell once a day as part of his daily practice routine, which turned out to be a good thing, for when he saw the colors of the runes forming above his palm he nearly lost his train of thought. They formed in shades of silver, gray, and black with none of the ordinary chromatic hues he was familiar with. Discipline alone got him through his surprise, and a few seconds later the spell was ready. He released it, and silver flames formed around his body.

  “What is that dark thing?” he asked, referring to the mound or pit (he still couldn’t decide which it was) that lay before them.

  “You call them congruence points. There are none to this plane from your world, which is why I brought you here.”

  “Which plane?”

  “Your kind usually call it Hell, not that any humans have seen it to make such a judgment.”

  “Wait, what?” Will’s words went unheard as the Cath Bawlg leapt forward and dove into the nebulous darkness. The world shifted, and Will gasped, shocked by a pitch-black sky that hovered above a brown landscape of stone pillars and shattered boulders. The air burned his lungs as he inhaled, and he began to choke. At the same time, Will noticed that the Cath Bawlg was also covered in silver flames, though he wasn’t producing them. The goddamn cat was protecting himself.

  “Keep your energy focused on the demon-armor spell,” cautioned his mount. “The basic essence of this place will erode your flesh and melt your bones if you don’t vigorously resist it, and that includes the air.”

  His turyn was rapidly diminishing as the flames that surrounded him flickered and began to thin out. He might have panicked if he had been in the same situation a few weeks ago, but times had changed for him. Will had survived a worse drain on his turyn at the dam, he’d endured the worst pain of his life at the hands of the king, and his sanity had been tested by the sight of both himself and his friends being taken for food by creatures too vile to exist.

  Put simply, Will was done with panic—at least for the time being. Give me a few years of rest and relaxation and maybe this will bother me, he thought grimly as he expanded his outer shell and ramped up his turyn absorption. Between the demon-armor and the small additional drain of the climbing spell, he still only had to push himself to roughly half of what he considered his maximum absorption rate.

  Better still, since he was absorbing and converting a portion of the void turyn before it reached the demon-armor, he actually lessened the amount of energy it took to maintain. The strain was more than bearable, and Will found himself enjoying the challenge. A rough smile appeared on his face. Every day I get thrown into the fire, and every time I emerge stronger, he thought. His control of turyn, both within and without, had grown to a degree that he could now feel the difference. Much of the growth had happened slowly, over the past year, but the tests of the present had brought the changes into the light where he could notice them.

  “This is nothing!” he yelled into the air—air that could no longer hurt him. A slow rumble built between his legs before erupting into a complementary roar from the goddamn cat.

  Unlike the Shadowlands, Hell was easier for his brain to make sense of. The realm had an understandable geometry that didn’t threaten to twist his mind into knots. It wasn’t pretty, but aside from the fact that every part of it was utterly inimical to life, it was knowable. There was a sky above, stony soil below, a host of rock formations, and occasionally strange black, red, or orange plants.

  If one could get used to the bizarre color scheme, it might even be beautiful in places. “This isn’t quite as awful as I expected,” said Will aloud.

  “The wilderness isn’t as bad as the populated regions,” replied the cat. “But all of it is hideous because of the basic nature of its existence.”

  “Which is?”

  “The realm is parasitic. It feeds and grows by stealing matter, turyn, and all other manner of resources from other planes.”

  Will was shocked by the revelation. It simply didn’t fit within the model of reality that he had constructed over the past few years. “How can a plane steal from other planes?”

  “Through the governance of the demon lords, but the truth is that they’re a product of the realm too. The Shadowlands weren’t always as you saw them today. My home was once beautiful. What remains is a hollowed-out husk, the unwanted remnants left behind by the predations of demon kind.”

  Will fell silent, unsure what to say. The goddamn cat had made no secret of who his enemies were: the fae, the elves, and demons. Now Will could understand why he hated demons so much. He mulled it over for several minutes, then came to a new question. Were there similarities between the Cath Bawlg’s enemies?

  “Is Faerie the same?”

  “As what?”

  “As Hell,” said Will. “Is it parasitic too?”

  “An astute observation for one so young,” said the demigod. “Faerie is a disease, but unlike Hell, it doesn’t destroy and kill its hosts. It connects to multiple realms, growing slowly and poisoning everything it touches.”

  “Is that why you hate the fae?”

  “One reason, yes,” admitted the demigod.

  “And the elves?”

  “I hate the elves because they knew better.”

  “Better than what?”

  “Keep growing, wizardling. You’ve impressed me today. Eventually you’ll understand enough to ask the right question, as you just did regarding Faerie. If not, ask me again in a century.”

  The refusal to answer was frustrating, but Will also felt a faint glow of pride. He’d never heard a compliment from the goddamn cat before. “Do you think I’ll really survive a century? I barely survived the last week.”

  “That depends entirely on you.”

  Will thought about that for a moment. “I think there’s a lot of dumb luck involved too. There have been plenty of times when things could have gone just a little worse and I wouldn’t have been able to survive no matter what I did.”

  “Trust me, that will never happen.”

  “How can I believe that?”

  “Because I’ll make sure of it,” said the Cath Bawlg. “There will always be a way.”

  The goddamn cat had spoken to him on so few occasions that Will didn’t know whether to believe the demigod or not. On the one hand he had never known the cat to lie to him, but on the other, the fae never lied either, and he knew how their advice worked. The best evidence he had to go on lay in what had occurred just the previous night. He’d been on the verge of giving up, until the goddamn cat had shown up.

  Not that he fucking helped or anything, thought Will sourly. But he did make me mad enough to keep trying. He resolved to ask Arrogan’s advice on the matter later. After all, his mentor had a great deal more experience with the Cath Bawlg.

  Something bright made the horizon glow ahead. “What’s that?” asked Will.

  “Our exit back to the Shadowlands.”

  “Why is it so bright like that?”

  “It’s one of the tears that the demons use to drain the vitality from my home, much like the one we entered through.” Another growl issued from the demigod. “It appears someone has anticipated our destination.”

  Looking forward, Will saw a collection of oddly shaped humanoids. They were roughly
human-sized, but they were both muscular and grotesque in their proportions. Many of them held strange black rods in their hands. “What are those things they’re holding?”

  “A weapon, similar to a bow or crossbow,” answered the cat. “Each one can only fire once, but it hurls a nasty black bolt similar to a quarrel. They’re poisoned as well. One hit would probably kill you, so be careful.” The Cath Bawlg picked up speed, his paws tearing the stony ground as his claws emerged to provide extra traction.

  “You’re heading straight at them!” yelled Will.

  “Guard yourself and my flank,” said the cat, his voice becoming a roar at the end of the sentence.

  Will still had one illumination spell prepared, but as they charged, he readied a wind-wall and a force-lance as well, but he didn’t keep a spell in hand. He wanted it free so he could use his shield as necessary, and the closer they got the more necessary it looked like it would be.

  The demons scattered before their approach, moving to the sides and aiming their strange weapons. The Cath Bawlg picked a target, though, and focused on running directly at one of them despite the frightened creature’s attempts to evade.

  Will tried to watch all of them, even though it was impossible. He could only block what he saw coming. At ten yards, the demons began firing, their weapons erupting with puffs of smoke and sending black rods flying toward them at speeds too quick to see. Will felt his point-defense shield activate a dozen times in the span of a second. It happened at a level just below conscious thought, which, though it should have been strange, felt oddly familiar to him.

  Even so, several shafts got through, burying themselves into the goddamn cat’s thick coat of fur. If the weapons bothered the demigod, he gave no sign of it. With one last great leap, the cat flew through the air and landed on his chosen target. The result was almost instantly fatal for the hapless demon.

  Will’s body whiplashed back and forth as the massive feline he rode turned and ripped into those enemies who were closest. He tried to keep his eyes open and block new attacks, even though the speed of the cat’s movements made it difficult to focus. After a few seconds he gave up and switched tactics. “Guard your eyes! It’s going to get bright!” he yelled, releasing his prepared Ethelgren’s Illumination.

  If the sudden light bothered the goddamn cat, Will couldn’t tell. Of course, his own eyes were tightly shut, but the beast’s violent spins and leaps continued unabated, so he hoped all was well. As the light began to fade, he opened his eyes, only to find one of the creatures had latched onto the demigod’s tail.

  The goddamn cat was protected by his own version of the demon-armor spell, but this demon seemed not to care for its own safety. It ignored the burning flames and crawled resolutely forward, stabbing claw-like fingers into the cat’s hindquarters. Will unleashed his force-lance, blowing the blighted demon’s head from its shoulders. The rest of the body fell away a second later.

  A moment later, Will’s stomach rose into this throat as they suddenly took flight. The Cath Bawlg leapt an incredible distance, covering more than twenty yards as he headed for the tear that would take them back to the Shadowlands. The demons, most of them still alive, couldn’t hope to keep up with his speed, but those few who hadn’t fired already lifted their weapons to aim. Twisting to keep his eyes on them, Will felt his shield activate five times in quick succession. He couldn’t be entirely sure, but he thought he had blocked all the enemy’s shots.

  The world shifted and twisted, becoming darker and more difficult to comprehend. They were back in the Shadowlands. This time Will gave up trying to understand and simply closed his eyes. It was better than getting a headache from the bizarre geometry of the goddamn cat’s home plane. “How much farther?” he asked.

  “Not far,” said the cat, his voice sounding labored.

  “Are you hurt?” asked Will, but the demigod didn’t respond. Will worried, but there was nothing he could do. The cat continued running, and he could only hope nothing serious was wrong.

  Chapter 28

  They emerged from the shadows of a tree deep in what Will presumed was the Glenwood. “How close are we?” he asked.

  Panting, the Cath Bawlg replied, “Your old home is a mile to the south of us.” There was a sick, wet sound in his voice.

  “How badly are you hurt?”

  “More than I would like.” The cat stopped and sat on his haunches. Will took the opportunity to release the climbing spell and slide to the ground. He moved around to survey the massive beast from the front.

  Three black metal shafts were buried in the goddamn cat’s chest. Will wasn’t sure how long they were, but only a short span of inches was still visible. “Those don’t look good,” he observed calmly, remembering his mother’s oft-repeated advice. Never panic in front of a patient. “Do you have some magic to remove them, or can you transform into your usual size?”

  “No and no. The metal is imbued with a magic inimical to my being. I can’t heal until it is removed, neither can I shift my size.”

  “But you can’t die, right?” asked Will. “You’re a demigod.”

  “Human labels don’t mean much, wizardling. Demigod just means, ‘too powerful for us to understand but probably not a true god.’”

  “But you can’t die,” insisted Will.

  “I have no idea,” said the Cath Bawlg. “I am unique. I have lived through uncountable years by human standards. I have never died before, if that helps, though the demons never stop inventing new ways to attempt it.”

  A surge of fear went through Will, but he suppressed it. “I can get them out, but it will hurt. If you were human, I might advise we wait until I had proper tools and medicines to make the process easier and safer.”

  “Get them out,” declared the cat. “Whatever damage the process causes will be nothing compared to what their magic is doing inside my body.”

  “It’s probably going to hurt a lot,” said Will. “If they’re barbed, I’ll have to cut into you to free them.” He was certain his feather trick wouldn’t work to extract barbed heads as large as these looked to be.

  Will summoned a paring knife from the limnthal. He kept a variety of cooking knives in there, and he liked them to have a razor edge. He studied the wound, then dismissed the blade, choosing instead to summon a larger, general-purpose knife with a sharp point and a six-inch edge.

  The entry point was tight around the shaft, which was half an inch in diameter. Looking at the metal, Will noticed it wasn’t entirely black; there was a shimmering blue almost invisible within the metal. Demon-steel, he realized. Or what did Arrogan call it, driktenspal? He thought he had the name right.

  Making a small cut next to the shaft, he tried to insert a finger so he could feel the length of the bolt. More cuts followed, until he could get two fingers in, but he still couldn’t reach the head. This thing’s at least a foot long, he thought grimly.

  What followed was an hour-long ordeal. The goddamn cat proved his resistance to pain, but even the demigod grunted and hissed as Will was forced to cut ever deeper into his flesh to reach the wickedly barbed metal points. His arms and tunic were soaked in blood before he had the first bolt out, and by the time the third was removed, he might as well have bathed in the demigod’s vital fluids.

  He stored the evil weapons in the limnthal, knowing how valuable the metal might someday be, and when he looked back he saw that the Cath Bawlg had already transformed, becoming once more the ordinary gray tabby Will had first met years before. “What’s your true size?” Will asked suddenly.

  “You’ve seen the Shadowlands,” said the cat.

  Will nodded, understanding the answer without truly being able to comprehend. The strange nature of the Shadowlands made things like size and shape into less tangible concepts. Kneeling down, he started to gather the cat into his arms, but the goddamn cat hissed and bared his teeth. “What’s wrong? Don’t you want me to carry you?”

  The cat’s warning yowl slowly diminished, becoming less
and less audible. Will eased forward and carefully collected his benefactor, ignoring the warning when the volume of the Cath Bawlg’s growl increased again. He’ll let me cut things out of him, or even ride him, but this is where he starts to get irrational, thought Will. He really is feral.

  Holding the bloody cat close against his chest, Will began the short trek home. Since they were within a mile of the house, he soon began to notice familiar groups of trees and similar landmarks. He was on familiar ground. He’d grown up playing in the forest, and now he knew exactly where he was.

  He approached Arrogan’s old hermitage from the front. He didn’t see anyone outside, so he stepped onto the porch and knocked on the door. After a few seconds, the door opened and his mother stared out at him, her eyes growing wide with shock as she took in his appearance.

  Will realized his mistake immediately. “I’m fine!” he hurriedly reassured her. “It isn’t my blood.”

  Erisa blinked and took a slow breath. Blood didn’t bother her, and she never lost her composure over wounds and injuries, but her son was an entirely different matter to her. Spotting the cat in his arms, she noted the bloody fur. “Is that?”

  He nodded. “Yes. He helped me get here, but we got in a fight along the way.”

  Erisa held out her hands. “May I?” Will handed the goddamn cat carefully to his mother, silently hoping the demigod wouldn’t lash out at her. The Cath Bawlg remained silent. Bloody cat in her arms, Erisa jerked her head toward the yard. “The tub is still around on the side of the house. Don’t come in until you’re clean.” Stepping back, she pushed the door shut with her foot.

  Will stared at the closed door, fighting to hold back a laugh. Some things never changed, and his mother was certainly one of those things. He looked around at the porch, then began constructing his favorite cleaning spell. It took a few minutes, but once he was done he set the boundary to include the porch before investing his energy and releasing it. Might as well clean a little extra while I’m at it, he thought.