The Magician's Key

by Matthew Cody

  “No,” said the Piper. “It’s about inspiration. A magician’s magic is more mysterious. More of an art, whereas common witchcraft is a skill. A magician finds one thing that connects him to the magic, that opens a conduit to all that power, and then he uses it in place of all this crafting. For me, it’s not just my music, it’s my special pipe. I’ve had it since I was a child.”

  The Piper leaned over and peered into the mortar. “But I started with this. My mother taught me, and her mother taught her. You might say it’s the family profession.”

  Carter stopped grinding. The ingredients had been ground to a lumpy powder. “You know, when I agreed to learn magic, I didn’t think I would be agreeing to become a witch.”

  “Then we have work to do,” said the Piper, “if you want to be more than that, more than just a dabbler in potions and powders. To become a magician, you have to discover your true soul. So, who are you, Carter?”

  “I don’t know anymore.”

  The Piper pulled his cloak around himself as the wind picked up. “Well, let’s start with seeing if you are the kind of person who can make a fire. Take a pinch of the powder and toss it onto the wood. Just a pinch.”

  Carter took a bit of the powder between his fingers and tried not to think about what the powder was actually made of. Then he dropped it onto the wood. “Are you going to say some magic words or—”

  Before he could finish his sentence, the little pile of wood burst into flame. It flared with such intensity that the Piper fell backward. After the initial conflagration, it settled into a warm, cozy fire.

  “Well,” said the Piper. “That was just a pinch, wasn’t it?”

  Carter nodded, staring into the mortar like he was holding a live grenade.

  “Powerful mixture—that’s promising,” said the Piper, tossing him a small leather pouch. “Keep the powder in that. It’s not dangerous as long as you’re careful not to let it touch anything wooden. Good to have if you run into another hangman’s tree, yes?”

  Gently, very gently, Carter emptied the contents of the mortar into the little pouch.

  “You see?” said the Piper after Carter had finished wiping the mortar and pestle clean of spark powder. “You have natural talent. All you needed to do was follow the recipe.”

  “Are you trying to tell me that all anyone needs to do is grind up some fungus and a few ants and they can make fire?”

  “No,” said the Piper. “You need to be a witch. Or a magician.”

  “Well, you—”

  The Piper cut him off. “I didn’t touch it. I never even handled the ingredients. Not once. It was yours from start to finish. Congratulations.”

  “Thanks,” said Carter.

  The Piper watched him for a moment. “I understand what you’re afraid of,” he said. “You’re afraid that if I teach you magic, then that means you might end up like me.”

  “No—”

  “You’re afraid you’ll go from being the hero to the villain.”

  Carter didn’t answer right away. The truth was, the thought had definitely occurred to him, and it was why he pressed the Piper so hard on good and evil magic. If he could, he’d learn enough magic to defend himself and maybe enough to help his friends. “How much is too much?” he asked at last.

  “Well, that depends on what you do with it,” said the Piper. “I keep telling you, magic is not good or bad, it just is. Like a man’s arm that he strengthens over time. If one day he uses it to lift up a friend who has fallen, well, that’s good. If he uses it to push the friend down, that’s bad. Helping hand or a fist—it’s always the man, never the arm.”

  The Piper pulled his hood up and stared into the fire, his face hidden in shadow. “You and I have much in common, Carter. The desire to prove ourselves in the eyes of others. But you didn’t grow up like I did. Hunger like a hot coal in your stomach. You didn’t watch as your neighbors threw rocks at your mother, driving her into the snow. You didn’t have to watch her waste away.

  “I don’t think there was ever any real choice for me. The magic had to be a fist. It had to be. But what you do with it is up to you. Fear me if you like, but don’t fear the magic.”

  They ate a supper of leftover stale bread and cheese, and they said very little. Carter’s head was swirling with too many thoughts to speak. He found himself clenching and unclenching his hand—open palm, tight fist. That’s when he realized that he didn’t fear the Piper. Not anymore. And it wasn’t just because the Piper had saved his life at the hangman’s tree. Carter didn’t know if that made him brave or foolish, but something had changed between them in the past few days. Something important.

  After dinner the Piper played a simple tune as Carter added wood to the fire.

  That evening Carter lay awake a long time and stared up at the sky. Every now and then he would flex his leg, as had become his habit at night. If he lay on it wrong and it fell asleep, he would start to panic, afraid that he’d awake in the morning and it would be twisted once again. But tonight he was thinking more about the fire, and about all the Piper had said. He took out the little pouch of spark powder and turned it over in his fingers. He could feel its warmth even through the leather pouch. An unnatural warmth, a magical warmth.

  The Piper had been asleep for several hours when Carter felt a little hand tug at his ear. Startled, he rolled over and found himself staring into a furry smiling face.

  “Bandybulb!” Carter mouthed the name.

  The little kobold nodded. “I am on a secret mission!” the kobold whispered, but not quietly enough for Carter. The Piper was only a few feet away, and Carter knew him to be a light sleeper.

  He shushed the little creature with a finger to his lips. Then he whispered, “Where have you been?”

  Bandybulb leaned close to Carter’s ear. “Making plans. Leetha has contacted the elves of the Deep Forest. Tomorrow they will be waiting for you along the old Peddler’s Road in the Deep Forest, past the Antler Gate. It will be a Winter’s Moon, and the elves will use the darkness to surprise him.”

  Nervously, Carter looked over at the Piper. His breathing was slow and steady, and he slept wrapped in his cloak.

  Carter found himself hesitating to answer. Why was he hesitating? “All right.”

  “Oh! One more thing.” The kobold lifted one finger that had been tied with a little bow of twine. “Leetha said this was most important, so I tied a string around my finger to remember. She told me to tell you that when the elves attack, you must get as far away as possible. Listen for the owl’s call three times, then three more. You must flee when you hear that signal. Otherwise, your life will be in danger, too.”

  “What do you mean? If they plan to capture us…” Carter’s words trailed off as understanding struck. The elves hated the Piper for supposedly stealing their children away all those centuries ago. Leetha herself had told Carter how bitterly disappointed she was that the Piper had been locked away for all those years, only to escape again. Tomorrow night, the elves weren’t planning to capture the Piper—they were going to execute him.

  Bandybulb beamed up at Carter, pleased that he’d been able to remember so much very important information. Happy, the little kobold snuck off again to report back to Leetha, leaving Carter alone with his thoughts.

  Carter didn’t fall asleep at all that night. He stayed awake until dawn, thinking about the young man sleeping across from him, the young man who’d turned into an ageless magician and who’d caused so much misery for so many. But he had once been a little boy, and a terrible wrong had been done to him as well.

  And tomorrow, Carter was going to lead him to his death.

  The sounds started late that evening. The shouts and growls they’d heard coming from the Shimmering Forest sent the Watch boys scrambling to their posts along the gate wall, and the bell ringers climbed the high towers, eyes peeled for any movement in the trees. This was it, they thought. The ogres were attacking.

  The attack didn’t come, but the monstrous
noises continued off and on, and the birds of the forest took to the air in fear. Even the faerie lights that gave the place its name retreated to less clamorous parts of the forest. After a few more hours, trees began to fall and the forest echoed with the sound of timber crashing to the ground. The ogres were near, but they weren’t attacking. What, Lukas wondered, were they waiting for?

  With the dawn came the answer. Lukas was at the gate, overseeing the effort to reinforce it with a hastily arranged barricade of tables, chairs and basically everything and anything that could be moved and stacked. When Lukas spotted Emilie running his way, he knew from her expression that she had bad news.

  The leaves on the Summer Tree, the ancient oak in the middle of the village, were falling. By afternoon the branches would be bare, and come evening a hoarfrost would creep over the land as the sun set for real. A Winter’s Moon would rise, and true night would fall. That’s what the ogres and their rat allies were waiting for. They would attack tonight under the cover of darkness, when the wicked things of the Summer Isle were at their strongest. And now that the seasons were getting longer, there was a good chance that winter would last well past dawn. There would be frozen days and pitch black ahead for no one knew how long. It would have been a challenge to survive even if they weren’t expecting a siege.

  Emilie and a few of the older girls had been planning to sneak the littlest ones out of New Hamelin. They would find shelter and safety among the seaside cliffs to the west. But with the coming of winter, that was impossible now. The children of New Hamelin would survive the siege—or fall together.

  Paul, meanwhile, had become an irritating expert on strategy.

  “I say we charge ’em,” he told Lukas as they walked the wall together and double-checked the firepots. “We paint our faces up like goblins or something, and we just charge into the forest, hooting and hollering like we’re crazy.”

  “We wouldn’t need to act crazy—we’d have to be crazy to try that, Paul,” said Lukas. “Hand me a few more torches, would you? I don’t want anyone to run out tonight.”

  The scout unwrapped the large bundle of sticks he’d been carrying and counted out four pine torches, their ends freshly rolled in pitch and pig fat. “Give me a dozen archers worth their salt and those ogres wouldn’t get within ten yards of the gate.” Paul’s bravado was mostly empty bragging, and they both knew it.

  “You’ll have every archer in New Hamelin up here on the wall tonight and then some,” said Lukas. “Laura and a few of the older girls have been practicing shooting apples for sport.”

  Lukas saw the incredulous look on the boy’s face. “I know, I know. But we need every person we can get. I’m putting the girls on the east wall, under Finn’s command.”

  Paul let out a low whistle. “Girls with bows. God, I hope an ogre kills me quick.”

  Lukas grinned. “Just wait until you see them. Emilie has had the middle girls working all night stitching pants! Can you imagine Emilie wearing pants?”

  Apparently, Paul could imagine it very well, because his cheeks turned a bright red. “She’s not going to be up there, is she?”

  “No,” Lukas answered. He’d been dreading this moment ever since this morning, when he and Emilie had tussled over breakfast. He’d argued with her until he was hoarse, but she had her mind made up. He might as well break the news to Paul sooner rather than later. “Emilie will be at the front gate. She’s taken charge of defending the inside barricade.”

  Paul nearly dropped his torches. “What? The front gate is where they’ll hit the hardest! Once the gate falls, that barricade of footstools isn’t going to hold back one angry kobold, much less ogres!”

  “Paul, lower your voice.”

  “I’ll tell her! I’ll reason with her. And when that doesn’t work, I’ll lock her in the outhouse.”

  Lukas hadn’t been any happier about Emilie’s decision, but at the same time, why shouldn’t Emilie take an active part in defending their home? If the barricade fell, then that meant New Hamelin had fallen as well. It wouldn’t matter where Emilie was if that happened. Nowhere would be safe.

  Lukas let Paul rant for a few minutes until the boy finally exhausted himself. He slumped against the wall, spent. “Blast it,” he sighed at last. “If I try to tell Emilie what to do, it’ll just as likely get me a black eye. Last night I tried to steal a kiss on the cheek at dinner, and she threatened to switch me in front of everyone. Then, as I was heading home to bed, she grabbed me into an alley and kissed me on the mouth—the mouth! I swear to heaven I don’t understand that girl.”

  Lukas would’ve liked to tell Paul that he didn’t understand either one of them anymore. Why were the two of them stealing kisses at all when the whole village could be under attack at any moment? Then again, maybe that was the whole reason—why wait until tomorrow when there might not be a tomorrow? Love, Lukas had just learned, would not go quietly into darkness.

  “Anyway,” he said. “If you want to join Emilie at the barricade when the attack comes, it’s all right with me. I understand.”

  But Paul didn’t have to consider the offer for long. “No,” he answered. “You need at least one person up on this wall who can fire an arrow without hitting his own foot. I know where I’m needed, Lukas. You can count on me.”

  Lukas put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. They’d been friendly when they started out on this adventure, but they’d come back as brothers. He thought about telling him so, but instead he just arranged the torches and set about filling the pitch pots in silence. All the while, the sounds from the Shimmering Forest grew louder as the day turned colder.

  The attack came just after moonrise. The cold that true night was brutal, but no snow fell. The sky remained cloudless, and the moon glittered overhead in a clear sky. If it stayed that way, the moonlight would work to their advantage, at least—the enemy wouldn’t be able to hide their numbers.

  The ogres lumbered out of the trees, four massive hulks, and it was obvious at once what they had been doing all day. Two of them walked in front, carrying fearsome-looking clubs made of freshly snapped tree trunks, and the two behind hauled an enormous object made of several trees tied together. They grunted as they dragged it through the frozen grass while a horde of rats darted here and there, their night eyes gleaming in the moonlight.

  The ogres had made the trees into a battering ram, and they were coming straight for the gates of New Hamelin. Paul had been right; they weren’t bothering with the walls—they were going to come through the front door.

  Lukas and Paul exchanged worried looks, but then Lukas shook off his fear—fear was dangerous on nights like this. The watch fires had all been lit, lanterns hung in every doorway to drive away the shadows. And the boys of the Watch, joined by the village girls, stood ready at the gate wall. Lukas, Eldest Boy and Captain, drew his iron sword and held it high for all to see. The sword had been held by every Eldest Boy before him, and every child in the village knew it by sight.

  With a nod from Lukas, Paul shouted the order, and boys and girls lit their arrows dipped in pitch. The ogres bellowed their challenge, and Lukas answered it as he brought down his sword and let the first volley of flaming arrows fly like falling stars in the night.

  The little shack where Max was being held was barely big enough to hold a small cot and a table and two chairs. One wall was covered in faded photographs of the elfling woman Maggie, the one who’d betrayed her. Only, in the photos she looked younger, and she was often standing next to a handsome young man. The people in the pictures were smiling and happy, which made sneering Vodnik look even more out of place sitting there in front of them. On the table next to him he’d placed the hideous fisherman’s box, his collection of souls.

  The magician ran his fingers through the tangles of his beard. “You are a slippery little thing, aren’t you? Haven’t made things easy on poor old Vodnik.”

  “How…How did you get here?” asked Max.

  “It wasn’t easy,” said the magician. �
��But I have servants even in Bordertown. They helped us sneak in.”

  Vodnik opened his box and searched for a jar. “Ah, there you are!” He held one up to the light of the candle, and Max could barely see the face of a handsome young man floating in the mist. It was the young man from the wall photos. “Take Maggie out there, for instance. This soul belongs to someone very dear to her. And since there are no crows down here, she acts as my eyes and ears, and I keep this little jar safe.”

  “You’re blackmailing her.”

  “Well, it would be awful for her if I accidentally dropped this, now, wouldn’t it?” Vodnik tossed the jar up and caught it just before it smashed to the ground. Then he laughed.

  Max hugged her backpack close, mindful of the two invaluable jars within.

  As if reading her mind, Vodnik frowned. “You have something of mine inside there, yes?”

  “No.”

  “What a terrible liar you are!” laughed Vodnik. “Try not looking down next time—it gives you away. Mr. Twist, if you’d be so kind?”

  Vodnik’s undead servant used his one remaining arm to snatch the backpack out of Max’s hands as easily as if she were a two-year-old child. Max grabbed for it, but Twist roughly elbowed her back to the ground and Max skinned her palms on the rough rock floor.

  Vodnik opened the backpack and removed the jars. He set them on the table. Her parents’ souls still slept peacefully inside, each floating in a tiny swirl of mist. “Good thing you didn’t try to open them yourself,” he said. “It would take a powerful magician to undo the curse I’ve laid upon your parents without killing them in the process. I don’t think a pink-haired girl with an attitude problem is up to the challenge.”

  Next, he removed the scroll case containing the Peddler’s map. Curious, he ran his fingers along the outside and held the map case to his nose. “Now, this smells interesting. I’ll need to give it a more thorough examination later.” He laid the map on the table next to the jars.