Dormael looked up when Indalvian mentioned the dreams. D’Jenn caught his eye and gave him a meaningful glance. They both turned concerned looks on Bethany, who was watching everything in rapt wonder.
“It granted him immense power.”
A new scene blurred into focus around them. They stood on a hill overlooking another army, a milling mass of men and horses covering the ground like ants. Ishamael hovered in the air above them, hands outstretched, eyes distant and cold. He wore only a pair of leather pants, and the twisting, sinuous metal of the Nar’doroc. It writhed over his body as he floated higher, pushing tentacles out of his back like a spider posturing before its prey. The rumbling noise that had started in the darkness grew to a deafening cacophony. The seven gems decorating Ishamael’s body glowed with angry light.
Flames whooshed into being at the foot of the hill, great burning spheres that rolled through the enemy lines, igniting everything in their path. The ground opened up and swallowed whole groups of people. Rocks began to float into the air and crash into the ranks of the enemy below, eliciting a din of screaming chaos. Lightning struck again and again, tearing through the enemy formations.
Panic gripped the men below the hill, and the army devolved into a terrified mob. Men screamed and died as they tried to get clear of the deluge, but flames rose to block their escape. Ishamael made no sound as the enemy forces were destroyed by the power he wielded. His expression was exultant.
“By the gods,” Allen said, eyes wide at the destruction.
“Oh, aye,” Indalvian agreed, a bitter twinge in his voice. “That’s their handiwork, after all. That is what they unleashed upon the world.” He turned his eyes to D’Jenn, and gestured at the scene playing out below. “Behold the use of a dreadful thing.” Indalvian let the scene play out for a moment longer, until the screams of the dying could be heard over the rumbling.
When Dormael blinked, they stood again on the hill with the ancient shrine.
“The Nar’doroc only knows ruination, only knows pain,” Indalvian said. “It will tear across all of Eldath until the world is a blackened husk—that’s what it seeks. It must be destroyed, or hidden away forever.”
“What do you know of its destruction?” D’Jenn asked. “It seems that if you could have destroyed it, you would have. How close did you get?”
“I didn’t,” Indalvian replied. “I discovered a way to sunder it, another to contain it. While the Signs were under my power, I studied them, laid every imaginable Ward over them. Very little of what I did had any effect. You could drop a mountain on them, or dump them into the heart of a volcano, and they would remain unscratched. In the end, I was forced to lull the pieces into a deep slumber, and guard against the possibility of someone ever using them again. I wish I hadn’t failed in that.”
“I wouldn’t say you’ve failed,” Shawna said, drawing everyone’s gazes. “Not yet. How long have you waited here?”
Indalvian gave her a sad smile. “This form that you see before you is not me, in truth. It is a piece of me that I left behind, a sliver of my consciousness.”
“How did you accomplish such a thing?” D’Jenn asked. “Preserving your consciousness—even a piece of it—over a thousand years or more? That’s no easy feat. How does one even begin?”
“My master was the caretaker of one of those isolated pockets of knowledge I mentioned earlier,” Indalvian said. “Secrets from a time before the dark age of my birth. My training was incomplete when he abandoned me, but it was still extensive. It was the war, you understand. His was a charge handed down for generations, and he took his duty seriously. I wished to fight. It came between us.”
D’Jenn’s eyes gleamed. “What happened to this ancient knowledge? Where is it?”
“Gone,” Indalvian said. “I searched for my mentor in my later years. I had…many questions only he could answer. My abandonment was complete, though. I never found him, nor the things he protected. In the end, I saw the wisdom of his actions. After my own failures, I built these places and left pieces of my mind to guard what they contain.”
“How many are there?” Dormael asked.
Indalvian gave him a level look. “If you don’t know, I’m certainly not going to tell you.”
Dormael shrugged and gave D’Jenn a sheepish grin.
“All that I know of the Nar’doroc I recorded into journals set aside for the purpose,” Indalvian said. “This spell will soon run its course, and you will find them in the room when you awaken. Take them, and destroy that foul thing if you can. In what little time is left to me, I will hope for your success.”
“What happens when the spell runs its course?” Allen asked, a note of trepidation in his tone.
“You will all awaken by the Dreamstone,” Indalvian replied, “and I will be gone.”
Dormael felt a pang of melancholy at hearing the words. Indalvian had been romanticized by the Conclave—near deified, in fact. It was jarring to come face-to-face with the man in this form. This scowling, morose character was nothing like the man portrayed in the stories. Indalvian had earned himself an honor-name from the House of the Noble for his legendary accomplishments. The stories all said he was a genius, a prodigy so outstanding that his like would never be seen again.
The man standing before them, wearing a simple, clean robe, looked nothing like a mythical hero. His face was lined with concern, his eyes full of defeat. Still, Dormael wished he could have days—weeks, even—to speak with him. The questions would be endless. What knowledge lay hidden in the man’s mind, what secrets could be revealed by his memories?
“There is another thing I would warn you about, since you mentioned that vilthinum had become involved in this affair,” Indalvian went on. “There was another—an apprentice of mine—who studied the Nar’doroc. He was privy to all my writings, my theories, everything. He had a sharp mind, but he was bitter. Angry.”
The hills disappeared, reforming into a crowded study. Several tables full of books, documents, and strange instruments occupied the space. A young version of Indalvian stared across one of the tables at a younger man with short, dark hair and even darker circles under his eyes. The scene was frozen, as if the two of them had stopped speaking in mid-sentence. The younger man had an accusatory finger stabbed in Indalvian’s direction, and Indalvian’s eyes were gray thunderclouds.
The older Indalvian waved his hand, and the surroundings suddenly kicked into motion.
“You’re just a cowardly old fool,” the younger man spat. “You’re so caught up in the death of your friend that you can’t see the bloody truth!”
“Truth?” Indalvian said, hissing the word through his teeth. “Is it truth you want, Asher, or is it power? You would have the entire world bow to a thing that couldn’t possibly be controlled. Have you seen what it can do? I have, and if you had, you’d know the dribbling insanity of what you’re proposing.”
“Just think for a moment, Master,” Asher said. “Think about what would happen if it awakens! You said it yourself—it can’t possibly be controlled. That is going to happen one day—”
“Not if I can bloody help it,” Indalvian growled, but Asher rode over his objection.
“It will,” Asher repeated, “no matter what we want. No one can stop that—not you, not me, nor any of these fools that have come down from the hills to follow you. Whether it’s a year from now, or a thousand gods-damned years from now, the Nar’doroc will stir in its slumber. It will seek a companion, and someone will take it up. The only thing we can bloody control is who that person will be. The Nar’doroc should stay here with us. It should be wielded by one of us.”
“And what, Apprentice?” Indalvian scoffed. “Who should wield it, then? Should we all vote? Hold a meeting and decide which of us will become a god?”
“No,” Asher said. “It should be you. Maybe even me.” Indalvian shook his head and started to turn around, but Asher kept speaking. “Think, Master! We are the ones who understand it, who are familiar with t
he danger it represents. We could start our own order, a group of learned people who can be relied upon to make the right choice when it becomes necessary!”
“The right choice?” Indalvian said. “The right bloody choice, is it? Let me tell you where you’re wrong, Asher, as I have done so many times—”
“Don’t you speak down to me, Master, I have been here for years taking such comments from—”
“Silence!” Indalvian roared, slamming his hand on the table. The moment stretched as the two stared daggers at one another. Asher set his jaw and returned Indalvian’s indignation, but he kept his mouth shut. When he was satisfied, Indalvian continued. “We do not understand the Nar’doroc, Apprentice. We are simply familiar with it. Furthermore, the entire point of our work was to hide it away precisely because we can’t trust people with its power. Not you, not me, not anyone.”
“That power exists,” Asher said. “We both know that it will awaken one day. The Wards are strong, but they’re temporary. Even should they last a thousand, thousand years, a day will come when the Nar’doroc will stir.”
“That day may come,” Indalvian said, “but long before that, I will drop those things into the depths of the sea, or see them buried under a mountain. The Chiefs may bicker and posture about them now, but I will outlive their children. The labor of my life will be to destroy the Nar’doroc—and I will see it done.”
“The Signs cannot be destroyed,” Asher grated. “Nothing we have done has even chipped the gods-damned things. Is not the more responsible thing to ensure that their power is held at bay? I’m not the only one who feels this way, Master, there are others who—”
“I have no patience for the bleating of fools!” Indalvian said, raising his voice. “None of you has seen the thing in action. You’ve heard of it, you’ve listened to the tales of your elders, but you haven’t seen it. You’re all stupid enough to believe—”
“Believe what?” Asher said, gesturing with angry hands. “We’re not fools, Indalvian! We know the Nar’doroc is dangerous, we know it’s capabilities—”
“You most certainly do not.”
“—and we know how much care should be taken with it.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Would you just listen to me for one bloody moment, I could explain—”
“Get out,” Indalvian snarled. Asher stiffened, but Indalvian set his jaw and gave the man an unwavering look. “I will hear no more of this nonsense. Spend your day seeking silence within, and come back when you’re ready to abandon this idiocy. That, or do not come back.”
Asher’s eyes burned. “Are you releasing me from your service?”
“You resist me at every turn, and now you tell me that you’ve been sowing discontent against me within my own Conclave?” Indalvian said, his voice cold. “There are others who feel as you do, are there? And where did they get these ideas, Asher? Where did they hear specifics about the Nar’doroc?”
Asher’s lips tightened.
“You think I’m a fool,” Indalvian said. “You forget who I am.”
“I’ve been with you for years, Master. I know who you are.”
“Gather your things, and get out.”
“It’s just like she said.” Asher gave a bitter laugh, and looked down at his hands. “I didn’t believe her, but by the gods, she was right.”
“What are you talking about?”
“She said you would cast me aside,” Asher laughed. “She bloody said it.”
Indalvian gave his apprentice a wary look. “Who said it?”
Asher stopped laughing, and regarded Indalvian with a sharp expression. He looked around the study, as if he wanted to savor its memory, and shook his head. His eyes fell again to his hands.
“There is power, Master, beyond the place where we reach,” Asher said. “Something beyond the songs we can hear.”
The older Indalvian gestured, and the scene again froze in place. The study twisted away into the darkness, taking the arguing pair with it. In a flash, they were once again standing on the windswept hill, with Ishamael kneeling before the bowl of blood. The memory was frozen at the moments just before the lightning began to strike.
“It was an old rite,” Indalvian repeated, drawing Dormael’s eyes. The old man was standing near to his own younger shape, which stood over the corpse whose blood filled the bowl. The older Indalvian’s expression was pained, full of the weight of long, regretful years. “Blood magic. Did you know that the ancients—the people who lived on this land before the Vendon—used to dismember people, and toss their bloody remains around their fields for a bountiful harvest? There are old stories of altars in the mountains to the north where children were slaughtered like sheep, all to please the gods of this tribe, or that.
“In the years before my own master’s birth, these practices were eradicated. In some cases the tribes were killed off, in others they were converted by the Church. As I said before, though—there are deep places in Eldath where old knowledge awaits.” Indalvian shook his head, and gestured at the illusion of his younger self. “My greatest mistake. It was I, you understand, who brought this practice back into the sunlight. When Ishamael demanded it be done, I would not allow anyone else to perform it. I was naive—a bloody fool.”
The hills fell away, swept into chaos by the invisible wind. When the shifting particles coalesced once again, the companions stood in the midst of the crowded study. Asher stood looking down at his hands, a sullen smile on his face. The younger Indalvian was regarding him with suspicion, both fists resting on the table between them. The older Indalvian paced around the motionless body of his apprentice, an opaque expression on his face. After a short moment, he sighed, and continued.
“Part of our efforts in suppressing the Nar’doroc was to study the way it was created,” Indalvian went on, his eyes pinned to his apprentice’s face. “Asher tracked down all the old writings he could find, and delved into those ancient mysteries. I wish to this day I had never allowed him to do so. He dabbled, and it twisted him.”
Dormael opened his mouth to say something, but no words would escape. While the appearance of vilthinum was rare, the damage they posed was a dire thing. He’d read all the stories in the Conclave’s archive about them before his more recent and visceral experiences—well, he’d read the interesting parts, anyway. To hear the very founder of the Conclave admit to culpability in fostering necromancy’s reappearance was stunning.
“I realized too late what had happened,” Indalvian said. “I should have researched the ancient magics myself, should have kept Asher from them. Perhaps if I had done something differently, he could have been saved. By this day, though, it was too late. Something had sensed him fumbling around in the darkness, dabbling with things he should have let be. It found him, and I was blind to it the entire time.”
Indalvian paused, then gestured at the scene. The memory dissolved once again, leaving them all standing in formless shadow. With a great sigh, the old man turned back to regard Dormael and his friends.
“We fought that day,” he said. “Our battle destroyed part of the city, and he escaped. There were eight other wizards who helped him, and disappeared with him.”
“And that’s when you formed the Warlock Brotherhood,” Bethany said, drawing everyone’s gazes. “What? Lacelle told me the story, don’t look at me like that. Hers was wrong, though, I guess.”
“Indeed, little one,” Indalvian nodded. “That’s a story for another time, though, I think. What you all need to know is that Asher was never found. His supporters, yes, but not him. I searched for the remainder of my life, but he was no more easy to find than my mentor before him. Asher’s secrets cannot have died with him. He wouldn’t have allowed it, and if vilthinum are circling the Nar’doroc, there is likely a good reason. He had years to continue his work. There’s no telling what he discovered, or devised, and what his writings may have contained.”
Dormael shared a look of dread with his friends.
Ind
alvian continued. “Our time will soon end. I can feel the spell ebbing. The last warning I’ll give to you is an admonition against donning the Nar’doroc. It will try and compel you, but its power is limited without a host. The urge to use it against your enemies will be hard to resist—believe me, I well know that. But wearing that thing warps your mind into something different.”
“How?” D’Jenn asked.
“I’m not sure how a Sign would work apart from the other six—as yours is now—but the Seven Signs together combine to forge a terrible combination. The names we’ve given them are shorthand, you see, to describe powers that we barely understand. The fiega controls fire, yes—but it also controls the absence of fire. A better description would be that it controls temperature, but it goes even deeper than that. The orthum controls the movement of earth, but again it is more than that. I’ve seen it do things to plants, or even living flesh. The most frightening Sign was named liensdrim—the Sign of Wisdom, in your tongue.”
“I’ll guess that it didn’t actually grant wisdom,” Dormael said.
“Correct,” Indalvian nodded. “What it did was allow Ishamael to…sense something. He said it was like a pattern, an underlying structure to everything. He described it as a grand sense of order, called it the Song of All Things. He spoke of events repeating themselves, strange reverberations in the undercurrents of reality, and other things that were near incomprehensible to me.”
“Things seeking equilibrium,” Dormael said, the words tumbling from his mouth before he could stop them.
A moment passed as everyone turned confused looks in his direction. Indalvian, though, peered at Dormael as if he’d seen a ghost. Dormael wished he could stuff the words back through his teeth, but there was no taking them back. D’Jenn’s ice-blue eyes were calculating, and Dormael felt heat rise to his cheeks under their scrutiny.
Curse my bloody tongue with a pox.
“Ishamael used the same expression,” Indalvian said. “He told me that all things seek equilibrium. Where did you hear that?”
The Seven Signs: Three Book Collection Page 114