“By Gadfrey, sir, so I am,” Jeremy returned. “Will you meet my terms? Question for question, lie if you like, but give me answers at least?”
“I ask first.”
“Done.”
The old man's eyes lost whatever look of bantering they held. He leaned forward, his face earnest, almost pleading. “How do you speak to the dead?”
Jeremy said, “I read.”
The Great Dark One sighed. “A trick.”
“Not at all. Why do you think language was invented? It holds thoughts, puts them into words. Writing puts those words on the page, and reading liberates the thoughts again, butterflies coming to life right off the paper. Do you think a book is dead? It isn't. I can pick up a book written a hundred years ago, or a thousand, or five thousand, and I hear the voice of the dead speaking to me. I speak back. ‘Why does your character do this?’ I ask, and the dead writer says, ‘Watch, pay attention, and I'll show you.'”
“Words, words,” the Great Dark One scoffed. “In our world, and I'm sure in yours, the dead go elsewhere—or they simply cease. All I am and all I have I would give to pierce that last mystery, were it in my power.”
Jeremy looked down at the man. “Now answer my question,” he said. “Who are you and why do you want me?”
The old man sighed. “Let us sit,” he murmured. “I tire of standing.” They sank to the surface of the platform together, wary of each other. An evil Gandhi, Jeremy thought with surprise as the ancient mage settled cross-legged, his gown of thunderstorm-color settling around him. The withered mage shook his bald head. “You cheat. That is two questions. Never mind; I like a cheater. First, who am I? I am many people. I am, or will be, you.”
“Explain.”
“Oh, I shall. On this very spot, some two thousand and seventy-four years ago, a man was born. This little plaque that we sit on is my sentimental gesture to that historic occasion. His parents called him Jilhukrihain, “Lake Blue Sky” in their language, for his eyes were of that color. He grew to be a powerful magician, and he studied many deep and ancient spells. But increasingly as he grew older he feared death, and hated it, for it would put an end to his knowledge and to his learning. He bent all his skills and all his talents to learning how to cheat death. And when he was very old, he found a way. He devised a spell, this Jilhukrihain: a spell that would copy his memories, intact, and his will into another person. He tried the spell with a young student of his, a wonderfully talented young man named Yawivonne. Jilhukrihain lived a few months more and then he died, but in Yawivonne all his memories up to the time of the spell were saved, and his will was growing, like a fetus in its mother's belly. The time came when that spell conquered the student, and the student became Jilhukrihain.
“But not completely. This was a new person, a person with the memories of both. The old person, the ‘real’ one, was dead. Still, just as the former Jilhukrihain had, the Jilhukrihain that had come to be desired endless life, immortality, and the cycle was begun.
“There have been many hosts in the two thousand and more years. I have the memories in me of seventeen different men and women, and sixteen of us are dead. Still I recall the first memory of Jilhukrihain: I was sitting in the shade as my mother picked lentils, and a red bird cried out overhead in the tree and frightened me. That happened two thousand and seventy-one years ago, but I remember.”
Jeremy nodded. “I think I see. You are an incarnation of the Great Dark One; your will is the will of the original Jilhukrihain, but your memories include the memories of all the people you have come to possess.”
“Yes. I have not yet learned the secret of immortality. I, the man sitting before you, will die. But first I will plant a seed in you, and it will grow. It is an interesting sensation. Days pass, and you feel only a mild discomfort, a feeling that you are changing. Then one day your left hand will not respond to your mind's command. Then your right hand, perhaps, or maybe your legs. Soon you are just a dwindling spectator tucked in a corner of your own mind. Your consciousness fades like a candle flame guttering. A little puff of wind comes along one day, and then the flame goes out entirely; then you are nothing, a collection of memories, no more.”
“And that has answered my second question,” Jeremy said. “I am to be the next Great Dark One. Why me, if I may ask an extra question?”
“It could have been anyone. I have always tried to choose magicians, for when I take their bodies and minds, I gain their talents as well. Oh, I am powerful now, Jeremy Sebastian Moon, for I am the inheritor of all the special people whose bodies I have taken. Mostly magicians, as I have said; though on one occasion, when my enemies thought they had seen the end of me, I was growing in secret inside an illiterate, deaf-mute peasant girl. That was horror! I could force the mouth to speak but could not hear the words, and so could not be certain that the next incarnation would even happen. It did; I took the body of a young man, a mediocre talent, who had come to sleep with the girl one drunken evening. The memory of that woman so tortured me that I sought her out and with my own hands put her to death, while the part of me that was still in her struggled to croak out a spell of defense.” The old man shook his head. “I wax garrulous in my old age. It has been long since I had someone to speak to. To answer your question more directly: your talent intrigues me. You pull mana from another reality, and with it, I might even defeat death.”
“But you haven't yet.”
The eyes hardened. “No, and that is bitterness and gall to me. I am tired of these long lives with death waiting at the end. But if I cannot live forever, I will live beyond the span of Thaumia! I will live to see the whole world empty and sterile, as quiet as Relas, and as barren. Then, when I alone am left alive, when death itself is all but dead, then I will laugh at fate and magic and the tired, sick joke of life, and I will truly die. I will die in the knowledge that I have outlived all, and that will be my triumph.”
Jeremy leaned back, his hands thrust out behind him to support his weight. “I do not think you are such a liar.”
“You will find out.”
“But you will die.” Jeremy smiled. “You think no one understands you, but you're wrong. Someone told me about you: he said you desire to swallow all life, to eat it, to make it part of you, and then when you've made Thaumia a desert you will stand in it at night, look up, and curse the stars because you cannot have them too.”
“Well, well.” The little man smiled again, too. Just two friendly magicians sitting on a giant stone cube in the middle of nowhere passing the time of day. “Perhaps your friend is right. We all have our failings.”
Jeremy squinted. “Your magic field is weak, old man.”
“I have used much strength in the war. Yes, it's true, I am not what I was three hundred years ago. Why, I could scarcely lift this cube that we're on with one hand. I am a shell, a pitiful wreck.”
“Then how do you plan to pursue your war against the magi of Cronbrach? Surely your cause is lost with the loss of the Hag.”
“Not at all. You should really see this; it's most interesting. Here, watch. Will you help me up?”
Jeremy got up and held a hand out. “Here you go.”
The Great Dark One rolled his eyes. “You are a fool, aren't you? I've just told you I could move this cube, and you believe that I'm weak enough to need your help? Don't you know I could begin to change you if I touch you?”
“You wouldn't. I'm your prisoner. I think I know you well enough to see that you'll be very sure to tell me when you begin the spell.”
“You are right. I think I will enjoy being you.” The Great Dark One put a papery, dry hand in Jeremy's, and Jeremy pulled him to his feet. “You are a young man. With the spells I know, you might live four, five centuries. Tell me: do you fear death?”
“I don't welcome death. I don't think man was meant to die calmly, or in resignation. But fear it? No, not in an abstract way. I will not die easily, when the time comes, if I can help it. But I will not find terror, I think, and for wha
tever comes afterward—well, I can hope.”
The Great Dark One shook his head. “You are too young.”
“Maybe. But just before my grandfather died, he told me he was sorry for me. I think he was sorry because he knew how I felt about his leaving me. I think he was sorry for me because he was getting to die and I was not. Death may be something wholly different from what you think it is.”
“You are completely crazy. It is refreshing to talk with you.”
“Thank you. And you're even loonier than the Hag was, you decrepit old son of a bitch, but at least you're civil when you want to be. Now, I think you were going to show me something.”
“Yes. How I will wage the war against the magi of Cronbrach—or if I die first, how you will do it. Observe the mirror.”
The Great Dark One positioned himself before the oval of glass and spoke a word. The cube shivered beneath Jeremy's feet, as if an earth tremor had disturbed it. The mirror flared briefly, light swirling within it. Then it cleared. Jeremy looked into his own bedroom back on Earth, though it was dark and indistinct. From the mirror poured a stream of light, converging as if focused on the old magician's chest. He spread his arms, the roomy sleeves of his gown falling down to his elbows, and absorbed the power.
“Magic?” Jeremy guessed.
“Yes. Sebastian knew nothing of this. It was a great chance for me to take as well, for I had no way of knowing whether it would succeed or not, but only Sebastian could have done it. I saw to it that he was exiled to the Between, you know. Yes, I betrayed him to the stupid magi, and I put it into their heads to thrust him into the dream-world, something they could do but I could not. You see, I hoped he would create a mirror there, and that through it I could drink in some of the raw creative power of dreams. I did, for a little while. Then he went on to another reality, and I found that it too had its powers. I haven't really tapped it yet. That pleasure will wait for you, my sweet morsel! But you, or rather the part of me that will become you, will soak, and soak, and drain, and grow more powerful until nothing on Thaumia can stop me.”
Jeremy put his hand in his pocket. Something small, sharp, and cold was there. He pulled it out. The Earth magic shed light across the top of the great stone cube, a warm golden light. In it Jeremy turned over his find.
It was only a tooth.
Jeremy came close beside the Great Dark One. He held the tooth up in the light streaming from the mirror. “Do you know what this is?” he asked. His hand felt warm, and the warmth flowed up his arm and right to his heart.
“I have no idea.”
“It's a souvenir of the creature your Hag killed. Nul, my friend. Do you know what it signifies?”
“You exasperate me with questions. What do you think this fragment signifies?”
“Your failure, Great Dark One. You old fool! I AM THE MIRRORS!”
He felt the ancient mage's cold anger and fear flashing out at him, but Jeremy was light, flowing back into the mirror, following the path that the beam on his hand had forged. Then he was in the mirror looking out, seeing the Great Dark One pronouncing some horrible spell. No, Jeremy thought. Not any more, you evil bastard. I can't kill you, but I can ruin you. I am on Earth.
He was on Earth.
Jeremy hung in an indeterminate space behind the mirror that Sebastian had placed in his apartment. The mirror drank magic, though Sebastian did not know that, and magic poured all around Jeremy in a flood, a flow of unimaginable force. He absorbed it, swelled almost from the glut of it. He willed to see into the room, and instantly began to perceive outlines, forms, shapes.
Two figures in the bed, one dark-haired, one blond, sleeping like nested spoons beneath a pale blue sheet. A stir in the faint light from the window, a click, and the bedside light came on. Sebastian Magister sat up against the pillows, all tousled hair and gasping mouth, his chest bare, his eyes wide. Jeremy could not hear him, but he saw the word form on the beardless lips: “You!”
Cassie, nude, sat up beside him, her eyelids thick with sleep. She asked Sebastian a question, touched his face. Sebastian spoke to her, smiled, but his eyes darted sideways, drawn by the bearded apparition in the mirror. Cassie followed his glance, stared for a puzzled moment directly into Jeremy's eyes, and screamed.
“Sebastian,” Jeremy howled. “Sebastian, you bastard!”
He could climb out now and throttle the magician who started all this, and he ached to feel Sebastian's throat constricting under his grip—but not now, not when he had to do what he had come for. “It's all a dream, Cassie,” he said, willing her to believe it. Out in the bedroom she had buried her face against Sebastian's chest, and he had spread the sheet over her, hiding her face from Jeremy. He could still see her hair, though, and he concentrated on it: “You've had a nightmare, Cassie, and now you're going to sleep again. It's all a dream.” He pushed his fingers through the glass, felt them pierce the surface, curl around in the sweet air of Earth, grasp the outer plane of the glass itself in their grip. Nothing could make him let go, not Sebastian's frantic gibbering, not the memory of Cassie's horrified eyes. Not even the promise of home would release that grip, not the keen desire he felt to come through and end the whole impossible fantasy by waking up from the nightmare that was no nightmare. Not death itself, he knew with certain and grim knowledge.
“Now,” he yelled. Already at his back he felt the Dark One's spells coming after him, strong and fuming with anger, with hatred, and, yes, with fear, trying to dislodge him or to change him. “Now I'm coming through. Hear me! Mirrors, all mirrors—break!”
He hurtled backward as if he had been struck by a truck, but his fingers had locked onto the glass, had become a part of the glass, and the glass shattered, following him. He saw it dancing through space just in front of him, sharp and beautiful and deadly, glittering and flashing in the last beams of magic ever to reach Thaumia from Earth. His back hit the Great Dark One's mirror, but he had given the command, and that too broke. The oval frame hung empty. A snowstorm of broken glass whirled between Jeremy and the frame, but through it he had glimpses of the wizard who wished to live forever stretching out his clawed hands in impotent fury. Then the Great Dark One was gone, left behind. The Hag's next and last, and then release.
I will not die easily.
Dark One, can you hear me? I'm laughing.
The mirror—crash!—and then the wall, knocking the wind from him, and a deadly shower of all those daggers striking him, raining all about him. He felt the cuts as cold spots, striking him like the first fat drops of a spring rain, and he saw the blood not red but black. But deep in his mind he was warm, ready for sleep. There, he thought. That's done. At last that's done and now I can rest.
Except for the woman. She hauled him most damnably over rough stone. She yelled in his face and slapped him. “Go on,” he said. Get out of here, he thought. Leave. Go without me. I don't want to come out of this warm place into the cold anymore, not ever again. “Go.”
Kelada would not go on without him. She screamed something in his ear. “What?” He had to listen. What a bother.
“The whole castle is falling into the mere! Help me! Walk, can't you?”
“No,” he said. “I'm dying.”
“Then I'll drag you every step of the way!”
“Kelada,” he said. “I am sorry for you.”
Tumult and confusion. Darkness all around him, and the sounds of toppling stones. The unnatural lake of the Hag's making was claiming its own. He looked to his left, and Nul lay there, his orange eyes pale, his mouth open, his gums showing almost no color. “Nul,” Jeremy said. “I'm glad you're going with me. Listen, do you know what the magic was? It was friendship. I thought of you, and the ward wasn't there anymore. Your damned old tooth I knocked out. The ward kept out anger and attack, but it couldn't keep out friendship. The Great Dark One doesn't know the meaning of the word. Of course he can't defend against it. Am I talking? Doesn't matter. You look afraid, Nul. Don't be. It isn't so hard to die.”
&nb
sp; There was something he wanted to do. He opened his eyes again. A moment had gone past, or an hour. The sun was in his face. Hot and bright, like the magic stolen from Earth. The old fool. That magic was in him and of him, and he shared its essence. He became that magic for just an instant, for just long enough to flash into the mirrors and beyond all reach. But there was still magic in him, some work of magic left to do. Kelada stooped over him. “I'm trying to bandage you,” she said. “Hold still.”
Jeremy moved his left hand, held it close before his eyes. An inch-long triangle of glass had embedded itself in the base of his thumb. He grasped it with his right thumb and forefinger, and pulled it out. Tip downward, it dripped blood. “For the woman who wants to be beautiful,” Jeremy whispered.
Kelada was weeping. “Stop.”
“Can't stop, it's a spell. In English. Wish I could have taught you English, Kelada. Here goes. The one and only elixir of loveliness. Only one drop will make you just as beautiful as you ever wanted to be.”
“Oh, God, stop!”
“Guaranteed for a lifetime. And in a bottle ... to match ... your true beauty.”
He held no longer a shard of glass but a tiny bottle, a clear, flashing crystal shaped exactly like a teardrop. Deep in its heart was one precious golden drop of liquid. “Take,” he said. “Drink it.”
“Jeremy! Damn you, don't die!”
“Take.”
She took the bottle and clenched it against her. Her face was twisted into a mask of despair, and tears spilled from her eyes, dripped from her ridiculous elfin chin. He tried to give her a reassuring smile, but he was too tired. “Sorry,” he wanted to whisper, but it came out “Soft,” and he let it go. Now, he thought. Now I can die.
He closed his eyes and all was peace.
Chapter 15
Nul was with him. “Did you suffer much?” Jeremy asked, surprised that his voice worked even now.
“Nah, nah, not so bad. You want something to eat?”
“I still hurt. That can't be right. What did you say? Eat? But—”
Moon Dreams (The Jeremy Moon Trilogy Book 1) Page 29