Mithris sighed. In his heart, he knew that he would never be able to stay away. He needed to become better and stronger. He needed to be able to cast traveling spells that took him where he wanted to go, not some rock on the side of a cliff. He needed to be able to defend himself from bandits and mad wizards alike. He needed to know, most of all, what it was he had done to Zerto’s spell.
Master Deinre’s spellbook, said Vapor, sounding more confident as it sensed the determination in Mithris. He spent decades trying to shape magical energy, but he never achieved anything like what you just did. Still. Read his notes, Mithris. They will tell you where to begin.
Mithris nodded. He had heard Deinre speak of this a time or two, but the Master wizard never told him much. Mithris was just an apprentice, still in his first decade of training. Master Deinre had worked magic for centuries.
He would read the notes in Deinre’s spellbook. He would study and practice. He supposed he would have to find a tower, or something like it.
Mithris was deeply troubled. He knew the crystals were right. Zerto had given him no choice. He had seen himself in the paranoid wizard. It was a twisted reflection of Mithris’ own distrust of wizards. He wondered if he would end up the same.
On the other hand, Zerto had been right about him. Mithris had come to take the crystal. It was that simple. He never meant to kill the wizard, but he’d done it. If he hadn’t come for the stone, he would never have had to. Mithris eyed the glimmering foundation crystals set out on the ledge before him. Vapor had talked him into it. The foundation crystals wanted to be joined together.
Why?
What were the crystals planning to do once he’d brought them together? And what else would they manipulate him into doing before they were through?
Mithris looked up and into the distance. The sun was setting in the distance. He watched it over the tops of trees far below his perch and sighed.
Chapter 35
Mount Wileth
Mithris stared at the painting in horror, shaking his head in slow denial. He sat at a long table in a scriptorium of the Grand Library. Spread before him on the table were an assortment of maps and a thick tome, the travel memoirs of a long-dead explorer.
Mithris had come to the Library to find out where he must go next. The foundation crystals — Vapor, Depths, and now Terra — could tell him the general direction, but for some reason they could not readily sense the fourth crystal, Ember, as easily as they had sensed each other.
Now Mithris had a pretty good idea why, and the painting which had just been wheeled in and unveiled by one of the stooped, elderly Librarians convinced him he did not want to go find out if he was right.
Mount Wileth lay five hundred leagues from Carran’s Landing and the Grand Library, but with his traveling spells Mithris could be there in an hour, give or take an hour. The painting, done in lurid oil on canvas by some eyewitness to Wileth’s last eruption, showed him what would be waiting.
“No,” he said. The Librarian, who had turned to shuffle off to wherever they hid when no one needed them, turned and gave him a stern, admonishing glare. Moving with painful slowness, the stooped old woman raised a finger to her lips. Then, with a sniff, she turned and moved away among the towering shelves.
“No,” Mithris repeated, lowering his voice. Reaching beneath the table, he untied a stout leather pouch from his belt and lifted it to the edge of the table. Loosening it, he opened the pouch around the three large gemstones within. Vapor, Depths, and Terra. “I am not going in there,” he told the foundation crystals.
Of the crystals — three of the most powerful artifacts in all creation — only Vapor seemed able to speak directly to Mithris. The crystal made itself heard directly in the young wizard’s brain.
Ember is inside that volcano somewhere, said Vapor. That does explain our difficulty in pinpointing its location. You’re right about that.
“I can’t go into a flaming volcano,” Mithris hissed, eyes drifting back to the painting. In vivid reds and orange slashed with stark and sooty blacks and grays, the painter had somehow captured Mount Wileth in the single breath before eruption. The mountains smoldering mouth belched thick smoke as the red-hot magma swirled and bubbled and began to rise. Mithris could almost feel the heat. He shook his head.
Mount Wileth has only erupted once in over a thousand centuries, said Vapor.
“Then it’s probably overdue,” countered Mithris.
What? Vapor’s voice was muffled somewhat, indicating it spoke to one of the other crystals. Not for the first time, Mithris wished he could hear all three of them — and then immediately wondered if he’d lost his wits. Why should he want more voices in his head?
Well which one is…Oh. Vapor made a sound in Mithris’ head, like a clearing of the throat. Mount Wileth has only erupted once in over a thousand months, the crystal corrected itself. I was in error.
“Months?” cried Mithris, then slapped a hand to his mouth and looked guiltily around the scriptorium. No Librarian sprang out to scold him, and he continued in a quieter voice. “A thousand months? That’s…how many years is that?”
Oh, how should I know? Vapor sounded irritated, but Mithris figured the gemstone was embarrassed. Time in your plane means nothing to us.
“Yeah,” muttered Mithris. “That’s because you’re immutable protrusions of the first foundation. Unlike me. I can get killed, remember?”
You’re a very capable young man, said Vapor. Mithris snorted. You are, Mithris. It is why Master Deinre chose you for his apprentice.
“And why you lot have chosen me for…whatever it is you’ve got me doing.”
You don’t always know what you’re doing, said Vapor, but you always know what you’re doing.
Mithris puzzled over that one for a second, and the crystal went on when he said nothing. Master Deinre meant to unite the foundation crystals, Mithris. He put it off so that he could train you, but he always meant to return to it when you were ready.
“When I was ready…” Mithris shook his head. “Well, Master Deinre was killed before he could finish my training. That means I’m not ready.”
You’ve done well so far.
“So far you hadn’t asked me to go spelunking in a live volcano!”
You’ve fought powerful wizards and defeated them. Are you really afraid of a volcano?
“That’s right, I am.” Mithris didn’t hesitate.
You will carry three foundation crystals when you enter the volcano. You will be safe.
“Every time I go after one of your crystals, there’s always some crazy wizard who decides to kill me.”
What wizard would live at the heart of a volcano? Why would one ever even go there? Vapor did not seem to realize the irony in its questions.
“He’d have to be out of his wits,” Mithris muttered, shaking his head. “You promise I’ll be safe from the lava?”
Terra is certain of it.
“All right.” Mithris closed his eyes, scarcely able to believe he was agreeing to this. “But there’d better not be any crazy wizards there. And when this is over, you are going to tell me exactly what it is you three are planning.”
There won’t be any wizards there, promised Vapor.
Hundreds of leagues away, in a circular room at the top of a slender tower, a wizard sat hunched over his scrying bowl. The water within the bowl did not reflect the wizard’s features back to him, but rather showed him the face of a young boy with unruly brown hair.
“Mithris,” hissed the wizard, who sat in darkness at the pinnacle of his conquered tower. Eaganar waved a hand, and the image in the scrying bowl blurred and shimmered and changed. The dark wizard saw a tall mountain rearing over a glacial plain, the peak’s broken tip wreathed in cloud and smoke. The thick miasma glowed from within, reflecting the smoldering firestorm at the heart of Mount Wileth.
Eaganar bared his teeth. It was not exactly a smile.
“So,” he whispered to himself. “The apprentice goes to Mount
Wileth. And we shall be waiting.”
Alone in his tower — alone for now, at least — Eaganar threw back his head and roared with laughter.
Chapter 36
Sweaty Spells
Mithris peered down into the smoldering mouth of Mount Wileth and groaned. He wasn’t really doing this, was he?
“Of course it’s not sitting on some dusty shelf in a forgotten closet. It couldn’t even be at the bottom of the sea. That would be too simple, too easy. It has to be lost inside an active volcano.”
We are rare and valuable, Mithris, said Vapor.
“I think you’re confusing valuable with nearly impossible to obtain,” said Mithris. He shook his head. “Tell Terra I’m ready, and let’s get this over with.”
Mithris had run the librarians ragged over the past three days, hunting for any information about the earthstone. He had spent last night memorizing the spells he would need to use today. He hoped they were the only ones he’d need to cast.
Closing his eyes, Mithris spread out his arms and began the first incantation. The thick, glottal tones of magic spilled over his lips and spread through the ether. He reached out to the nearest ley lines to fortify his own strength, and summoned a magical ward that would mold itself to his body and sheathe him against the heat.
Sweat dripped down his brow, but Mithris felt the heat receding. He stood in a tiny pocket of cool air that folded itself tightly around his body. The stifling waves of heat that rolled off the molten stone below no longer touched him. Where the heat struck his ward, it turned aside. So far so good. Mithris began the second incantation.
Standing atop the smog-wreathed mountain, high above an arctic wasteland, Mithris spoke the words. Lightning flashed above him in the dark sky. Frozen winds howled and whipped around the jagged peak, waging an eternal war with the heat which bubbled up within the mountain.
Mithris called on the air, through Vapor. He would need it to breathe in the smoke-filled chambers he must enter. Mithris called on the moisture of the snow and ice, through Depths. Mithris called on the molten stone itself, through Terra. He bound the elements together and laid them on himself like an armor that could not be seen.
When he was finished, Mithris opened his eyes and drew a long, deep breath. The spells had resolved sluggishly. He reached into his pocket, brushing his fingers over the three foundation crystals.
“They’re arguing again, aren’t they?”
They never stop, complained Vapor. Depths and Terra, well…you can’t expect earth and water to agree about things.
“Well tell them to focus,” Mithris snapped. “One of us is risking his life here.”
Taking the lustrous brown stone that was Terra from his pocket, Mithris held the foundation crystal tightly as he stretched out his other hand. He spoke the words of a cantrip he had only just learned. Far below, an area of the molten surface bulged upward. A glob of lava, detaching itself from the lake, rose into the air. As it hovered higher, it cooled. Bright orange-red faded to gray, cracks of light still blazing through as it became stone.
By the time the irregularly shaped platform reached Mithris on his ledge at the caldera’s lip, it had cooled completely and was solid throughout. Mithris stepped lightly onto the floating stone, gritting his teeth. It did not sink or plummet, but held him aloft. The young wizard breathed a sigh of relief.
Terra says you should have more confidence in your abilities. It’s right, Mithris. Your magical skills have increased more in the last year than in all your years with Master Deinre.
“Thanks,” Mithris said. He knew Vapor was trying to bolster him up. Well, that was better than making snide comments. Mithris would take what he could get. He commanded his floating platform, and it began a slow descent into the mouth of Wileth.
Sweltering heat rose around Mithris, distorting the air. He stood on his platform, protected from the scalding heat. His brow still glistened with sweat all the same.
As Mithris was lowered inside the pit, the caldera he had stood above became a broken dome over his head. Through the rippling air, Mithris could see steps chiseled into the rock of that dome. The steps led down nearly to the surface of the lava, but turned away when they reached a narrow ledge that hung five paces above the viscous liquid rock.
Mithris guided his floating platform of cooled lava over to the ledge and stepped gingerly down. The stone here was not molten, though it was still hot enough to have burned Mithris to ash without his powerful wards. He stepped lightly down and quickly explored the narrow outcropping of rock. There was nothing here, and the steps ended suddenly.
“Of course,” Mithris said to himself, leaning nervously forward to peer over the edge. Why would it be lying on this ledge, where any mortal creature without magic would be incinerated instantly? Why wouldn’t it be down in the lava itself? Mithris looked down on a bubbling, smoking pit of lava. He swallowed nervously.
Taking out his wand, a slender length of supple willow, Mithris cleared his throat and uttered an incantation. He directed the flow with his wand, casting the spell down on the lava as it resolved. The rippling, bubbling liquid began to lose its color if not its heat. The lava slowly became transparent to his eyes and Mithris was able to peer straight down Mount Wileth’s throat.
Spotting something far below, Mithris sighed. “What does Ember look like, exactly?”
Ember is of the same approximate size as the rest of us, and lemon-shaped. It gives the appearance of cooling volcanic rock, solid and gray but with tracing lines of luminous fire shining through cracks. Lava bursts around it, a continuous eruption. The lava spurts orbit the crystal tightly.
“Yeah,” said Mithris. He had not supposed what he saw was anything else, but Vapor’s description confirmed it. He’d found Ember. The firestone was buried under at least fifty paces of lava. Mithris didn’t think the wards he’d cast were up to that, even with Terra’s help.
Those lava bursts aren’t exactly real, said Vapor. Just a magical projection, part of Ember’s…presentation. It won’t burn you.
“Maybe not,” said Mithris, rolling his eyes. “But the rest of the lava surely looks real, and it probably will burn me.”
You have a point, Vapor conceded.
“Are you sure Ember isn’t happy where it is?” Mithris asked, hopeful.
Don’t be absurd.
“Well…the heart of an active volcano seems like a fine place to be, if you happen to be a multi-foundational firestone.”
Ember says it is bored.
“Bored!”
It has lain in this volcano for more than twelve thousand days. It says it enjoyed Mount Wileth at first, that it was very cozy. But the cycle of eruptions is predictable, and the dormant periods between excruciatingly dull. That’s what Ember says, at any rate.
“Cozy,” muttered Mithris to himself, looking down at the boiling rock and shaking his head. “All right. We’ll have to go in after it. That means I’m going to need a seriously brilliant spell to keep from getting incinerated.”
Moving back from the edge as far as he could, Mithris sat down and opened Master Deinre’s thick spellbook over his crossed legs. Wiping sweat from his brow, he began to flip through its pages.
Chapter 37
Grimoire
Deinre’s grimoire was much more than a mere catalog of spells. It also held his research notes, his theories and experiments. Every page was densely inscribed. Much of it was complex magical theory that went far over Mithris’ head.
After several minutes of study, Mithris paused and looked up. He idly wove an air spell that created a funnel of rapidly moving air through the center of Mount Wileth’s caldera. That pulled most of the searing heat up in a shimmering spiral, and sucked the frigid air of the tundra beyond down to Mithris on his ledge. It was still stifling and hot, but the spell helped.
Mithris went back to the grimoire, biting his lower lip in concentration. The bulk of Deinre’s research had dealt with energy shaping. Most of what remained centered aro
und the foundation crystals, Vapor in particular. Mithris was sure it was all quite fascinating, but he didn’t see how any of it could be much use to him now.
Flipping pages at random, he came across a spell that was highly complex yet familiar to him. With a start, Mithris realized it was one of the first spells he’d cast from Deinre’s grimoire. He’d needed Vapor’s help visualizing the mental element of the spell. It had resolved into a shrieking portal to another foundation, through which the devinist that attacked him was relentlessly torn.
Mithris tapped his finger in thought. “I should be able to open a portal without piercing to another foundation. It would be a window to another place on this same plane, wouldn’t it?”
That is essentially what a traveling spell is, at least…
“No, but I don’t want to go through the portal. I want to pull something through it from the other side, the way that devinist was pulled through. Or like summoning a creature from another plane. Except, I open the portal to where Ember is on this plane and summon it through.”
Vapor was silent for a long moment. Mithris frowned. His plan seemed simple enough, and sound. He still had a sinking feeling, a certainty that the foundation crystal was about to point some gaping flaw.
That will likely work, Vapor said at last. Frankly, I’m shocked nobody has tried that before.
“Never?”
Not to our knowledge. If they had, and they’d succeeded, it would change the entire wizarding world.
Mithris was about to ask Vapor what it meant, but then he realized. Wizards were competitive and often nasty. If any of them could just open a window to any place in the world and snatch something through it, wizards would be thieving from one another constantly.
And Master Deinre, with his constant nagging about wards, would have taught Mithris a spell to block such portals. Since he hadn’t, that meant he hadn’t worried about it, and that meant no one did it. Mithris shook his head. It seemed so simple. If nobody did it…did that mean it wouldn’t work?
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