Shadowkings

by Michael Cobley

  At that point darkness enfolded light, red birthed black, white became silver became leaf green became jewelled blue became perfect circular ripples of oily shimmer. Bardow whispered the syllable which joined the beginning and the end of his fifth thought-canto, that of Binding. Opaque strands looped and looped around the composite spell, caging it.

  He sighed with relief and sagged in his chair. As the thought-cantos slipped from his mind, a fading carnival of sounds and textures and emotions, he wiped his face with a trembling hand, and rubbed the smarting ache from his eyes. Once, back before the Mogaun invasion, he had attended a conclave where this very task was performed by Archmage Agartil; it had taken him but a few moments and fatigued him not at all. But Argatil had died with the Emperor at Arengia and the Rootpower was shattered and gone, leaving only the inelegant methods of the Lesser Power with which to achieve the impossible.

  Sticks and mud to withstand the storm, he thought. And even with the Crystal Eye, it may not be enough.

  Above his table the spell was now a small pale orb, its face disturbed by tiny swirls of darkness that came and went. For now it was stable, but the antagonistic forces he had bound together would after a while begin to oscillate: then, it was a matter of bringing those forces into resonance with each other. Thus would he achieve his goal.

  Bardow gripped the arms of his chair and stood. But his legs felt frail and he staggered slightly to the side. Laughing weakly, he steadied himself for a brief moment then retrieved a tinderwheel from beneath a sheaf of parchments, lit a tallow lamp then walked gingerly over to the window. A heavy grey blanket attached to a pole and crosspiece hung like a banner across the shutters, and when he moved it to one side a tall, dazzling shaft of sunlight abruptly dispelled the gloom. Plumes of dust from the blanket sparkled in the brightness. Bardow tugged open the shutters, pushed wide the outer ones and leaned on the windowsill, resting his palms flat on the heated stone.

  Krusivel was bathed in the bright gold of a noon sun, an unexpected glory in this grey autumn. From the tower he could see people taking advantage of the uninterrupted warmth - washing was being hung out, roofs were being repaired, an extension to the barracks was under construction, and the horses were out in the upper fields, being run and raced by the ostlers and several of the knights. He breathed in deep and smelled grass and a hint of woodsmoke and suddenly found himself remembering...

  ...leaning out of a high window very like this, with sunlight in his face and the cold sharpness of mountain air in his lungs. And gazing down at a narrow, sloping street that wound its way through the town, past college halls, lodging houses and inns, with alleys leading off to taverns and stalls selling herbs or odd curios, tailors, flowersellers, scryers booths, a bakery whose delicacies were shipped to all the great cities, and an odd little shop which specialised in climbing paraphernalia. And looking up at the greenwings that dashed around the sky in great flocks, more often than not in flight from a predatory wolfhawk...

  Bardow closed his eyes, trying to hold the memory in place. Fifty years on and he could still recall his first days as a student in Trevada. His last visit had been a year before the invasion, since when he had heard only rumour and fourth-hand accounts of the awful havoc and slaughter visited upon the mage-town by the Acolytes after the dissolution of the Rootpower. If Suviel survived and returned with the Eye, he would finally know what if anything remained of the dear places of his youth.

  The sounds of children's singing voices reached him. Peering down, he spied a group of six or seven boys and girls sitting beside a clump of catear blooms. One lad was half-singing, half-giggling the old nonsense verse about the pig and the pigeon. When he finished, two girls with long, braided fair hair stood up, clasped their hands before them and began to sing:

  Little seed become a shoot,

  Little shoot become a twig,

  Little twig become a leaf,

  Little leaf become a shrub,

  Little shrub become a tree,

  Little tree grow tall and strong.

  As they sang, they acted out the words with their hands and finished with their arms raised above their heads and happy smiles on their faces. Bardow listened and watched with tears in his eyes. Although a simple child's verse, it contained, in a greatly abbreviated form, all the main elements of the Great Rite of the Fathertree which used to be conducted twice a year - at the height of summer and in the depths of winter.

  We are all in winter now, he thought sombrely. Yet our children still have the faith that we lost. Their innocence shields them from truth.

  Behind him there was a knock at the door.

  "I'm busy," he said over his shoulder.

  "No, you're not," said a woman's voice.

  He turned to stare. "I'm hard at work on a matter of great importance."

  "Not according to young Jeffi. He says you're sitting at the window and talking to the birds."

  Muttering, "Mother preserve me!", he went over to the table and sat a tall open book in front of the hovering spell, hiding it from view. Then crossed to the door, unbarred it and returned to the window, saying - "Come in!"

  A pretty young woman entered with a tray bearing some small bowls, a beaker and a jug. She smiled brightly as she brought it over and sat it in a small recess under the windowledge, then gave him an expectant look.

  "I have been eating, you know."

  "True, Shin Bardow, but bread and cheese is entirely unsuitable for someone of your position and responsibility."

  Fionn had waist-length red hair and wore a brown dress and yellow shawl. Some of the time she was Guldamar's assistant, but otherwise she seemed to have taken it upon herself to look after his day-to-day needs, bringing him food or having his clothes washed and mended. Bardow suspected that Suviel was behind this in some way.

  As he sampled some of the bowls' contents - cooked vegetables, a salad sprinkled with nuts, and hot biscuits - Fionn went to stand at the window. Bardow heard some of the children call her name and she waved back.

  "Congratulating your spies, hmm?" he said.

  She looked round, and sniffed. "I call them my little knights. I set them duties and tasks like brushing the paths or tidying the flowerbeds, and teach them some of the songs I knew at their age." She paused. "Till I began doing this, I hadn't realised how great a part of my life the Rootpower faith was, even as a child."

  "How old were you when the Fathertree was destroyed?"

  "Just seven," she said. "Mother cried for days and Father wouldn't say a thing. Our village priest left to join the defence of the Fathertree temple in Adnagaur. And after all the priests died, there was no-one to conduct the rites and speak the prayers, or teach the children or perform all the small duties that bound the village together. All that was left for us was to learn how to survive.

  "When Guldamar brought me here a year ago, I was still learning about the Lesser Power. It was Shin Hantika, when she was here the time before last, who introduced me to the children. I felt that I had to tell them all the things I knew as a child."

  Bardow felt a pang of shame at his earlier remarks. "So it was you who taught them 'Little Seed'."

  Fionn bit her lip. "Was I wrong to do so?"

  "No...I just wonder if such innocence is a help or a hindrance in this unforgiving age."

  She smiled. "The Earthmother priestesses are most thorough in their teaching of history, Shin Bardow - the children do know what happened sixteen years ago. I just felt that a certain joy was missing." She glanced back outside. "I'm surprised that the mages did not sense it long before now."

  Bardow laughed gently and she looked at him. He filled a beaker from the jug and offered it to her, then poured one for himself. "There you touch upon the dilemma at the heart of the Mage Order, such as it is. You see, before the invasion all the senior priests of the Order of the Fathertree were also members of the Mage Order, but not all mages were Rootpower priests. Yet when it came to the highest mysteries of the Rootpower, all mages studied at the
Earthmother Temple in Trevada. It was not as complicated as it sounds, rather it was a joining of the mystical and the practical, a loving dance, balanced and harmonious." He sipped at his drink. "So when the Rootpower was destroyed, and Besh-Darok fell, and the priests died defending the temples, none of the few surviving mages were priests. Bereft of their powers, some took their own lives while others went into hiding. With the Archmage dead, it was left to me to gather the stronger, more resolute ones and bring them here, where we work to increase our abilities in the Lesser Power and prepare for the coming struggle.

  "Occasionally, someone emerges and decides to join us, but most of the newer pupils are youngsters brought here by friends and allies." He smiled faintly. "All of them keen to learn and unafraid of highlighting their teachers' shortcomings."

  Fionn looked down. "I am sorry if I have been disrespectful."

  He shook his head. "What we do here is too important to allow respect to cloud the truth. Fionn - "

  Hesitantly, she met his gaze.

  "Continue teaching rhymes and stories to your 'little knights'," he said. "Bring joy into their days and their dreams."

  She nodded. "Thank you, Shin Bardow. Perhaps you might care to come out and meet them."

  Bardow thought for a moment. "Yes, I think I'd like that..." His voice trailed off as his ears caught a faint buzzing sound. Quickly he stood.

  "But not at the moment," he continued, guiding a surprised Fionn back to the door. "My apologies for hurrying you out like this, but there is something I have to attend to immediately."

  "Can I help in any way?" she said, pausing on the threshold.

  He shook his head. "There is some risk involved and I would not wish to expose you to it."

  "I understand. Till later, Shin Bardow."

  "Till later."

  As she left, he closed and barred the door, dashed back to the window and sealed the shutters, then went to the candle-lit table and snatched away the concealing book. The orb of the spell was visibly pulsing, its pale surface marred by criss-cross patterns of vibration. In his mind Bardow began the thought-canto of Binding once more in preparation for when the confined forces burst apart his first Binding.

  Seconds crept by. Wax from the candle on his table gleamed and dripped down the encrusted stem of its holder. Bardow licked dry lips and blinked eyes that began to ache with the intense, unmoving stare. Then the candle flame wavered as the pale orb cracked. Silver turbulence shimmered within, expanded. Instantly he cast the new Binding at the unravelling spell and after a moment the orb - now the size of his head - ceased growing. Its surface was a shifting, mirrored mosaic and he saw his own face reflected in it a thousand times over before the myriad facets dissolved into a perfect blackness.

  At last it was ready. Holding the Binding steady, he began the thought-canto Spiritwing. He tightened his concentration, focussed his being to an imaginary point on the orb's featureless surface. Details of the surrounding room started to fade as the Spiritwing strengthened its hold on his senses. Everything melted into the black orb and suddenly he was flying into its funereal emptiness, endless gulfs of night through which he fell. There was a coldness here in the Void Between, a coldness that tried to coil itself around the awareness and sap the will. But Bardow resisted it, drawing on the warmth of all his memories.

  Tauric, he thought clearly amid the exultation of flight. I want to see Tauric.

  The Spiritwing wheeled and dived and the darkness brightened to a threatening grey. He descended through a stormy sky, great rafts of cloud and veils of mist and rain. The clouds parted and he saw a long range of tree-covered mountains stretching away before him, grey and hazy in the downpour. It took him a moment to recognise it as the northern spur of the Bachruz Mountains which extended to the Great Valley near Sejeend in Roharka. Then the Spiritwing banked to the right, sweeping him past the uppermost peaks of several mountains and south towards the vast forest of Falador.

  Slowing, he came in low over the treetops near the forest's southern edge where it met the shores of Lake Ornim. Then the Spiritwing took him down among the branches, gliding gracefully through the trees. Water dripped from above but he heard nothing and felt nothing, only a heightened tranquility and the sharp purpose of his search.

  The light of torches and a campfire emerged through the gloom, the shapes of tents in a clearing, tethered horses cropping grass, and figures of men sat round the fire. Closer he moved, floating under tree limbs and over masses of foliage, and caught sight of Tauric off to one side, sitting opposite Kodel. With his good arm the boy was catching small stones tossed to him by Kodel. The stones came from the right and the left, or low or high, or with a spin, faster and faster till eventually Tauric missed one and burst out laughing. Kodel laughed with him, then paused, tilted his head as if listening and scanned the trees near Bardow's vantage point. Bardow smiled inwardly - Tauric might have none of the sorcerous potential of his Imperial forebears, but Kodel certainly seemed to possess some vestigial ability.

  As if sensing it had been detected, the Spiritwing retreated from the clearing. Bardow suddenly realised that there had been no sign of Himber, or Pirica, or the Lord Commander's brother, Coireg. However, a couple of Kodel's men bore bandages to head and hands - had there been a fight or an ambush? He pictured Himber's face, and when nothing happened he did the same with Pirica. The Spiritwing remained unchanged, which could only mean that both the advisors were dead.

  Then he thought of Coireg and instantly his view of the clearing shifted in a blur of leaves and smoke and campfire flames and when the haziness came back into focus he was inside a tent looking down from its peak. Coireg Mazaret lay asleep on a grubby pallet, his hands and feet bound with rope, his face bruised and scratched. Bardow grew worried. What had Ikarno's brother done to deserve this?

  At least the boy is unharmed, he thought. And Kodel seems to have taken to him, which is no bad thing.

  He paused to gaze inward at the Binding and make sure it was holding. The canto still gyred steadily in his mind, although sooner or later the composite spell it embraced would inevitably fragment by which time he would have to be back in his body. It would never do to be trapped in the Void Between for eternity.

  Suviel Hantika.

  All sight dissolved and slipped sideways and the Spiritwing flew on through yawning dark emptiness, unerring and urgent. Iciness clamped itself around his essence, seeking to drain him through the faultlines of his anxieties and uncertainties. But he fanned the embers of all that he loved, people and places, the past and even the present, and endured. Soon the darkness parted to bright sunlight over mountains. The Spiritwing was carrying him north, low enough to see small white goats on the snowy upper slopes, digging for grass and roots. Then the mountains fell away to a short stretch of flat plain leading to an ancient ruined citadel.

  He recognised Alvergost immediately and saw smoke trails rising from a crowded sea of tents. Refugees, he realised in dismay. Sweeping past overhead he just caught sight of some kind of riot at the foot of the great fortress. Then it passed out of view as the Spiritwing sped on over the mountains once more.

  He was descending towards a barren, narrow-sided pass when the Spiritwing slowed. The pass dipped and widened to where a pool fed a cluster of meagre trees and bushes, and where more than a dozen riders milled about as if in confusion. The Spiritwing began to shift Bardow back to the Void but he said, Wait.

  From above he watched the horsemen. Some were garbed in mail or half- plate armour, others in studded leather, but all wore enclosing helms that hid their faces. These were Acolyte guards, he realised, notorious for their ability to track a quarry across the most difficult of terrain. Yet here they were, plainly frustrated in their hunt. If they had been chasing Suviel and the others, where were they now?

  Suviel Hantika, he thought. Find her.

  Again, the black touch of the Void Between, its deathly chill seeping deeper than before, a sure sign that the Binding was starting to weaken. But
the Spiritwing seemed unsure of where to go - hazy images of mountains came and went, interspersed with glimpses of other places, a red chaos of shattered, drifting rock, a foggy green jungle, a sun-blasted plain. Instinctively he knew he was seeing snatches of the Realms, regions of primal power that were home to a host of spirits and entities both beneficent and malefic. He remembered undergoing the Rite of Tempering in a mountainside shrine above Trevada, and the ecstatic prolonged vision which had propelled him like a stormblown feather through the Realm of the Fathertree. That place had been vibrant with life. Flocks of indescribable creatures had carried or guided him on his journey, entire herds of animals had conversed with him in a single voice, and a majestic, towering tree - just one of an limitless forest - had spoken with many. He had awoken from the Rite a true mage, marked heart, mind and soul with the Rootpower.

  A dead power, an empty throne. It was a bitter loss to know that these fleeting glimpses of the Realms were all that the Lesser Power would ever be able to show him. It was a wound that could never heal.

  Still the Spiritwing wavered between places, only now one in particular began reappearing more often, the fog-swathed jungle. For a moment Bardow felt a spark of hope, then disquiet as he realised that it was either following the Spiritwing or drawing it closer. The darkness of the Void shaded into the misty murk, yet remained at the back of his awareness, holding him at the threshold. Bardow saw a dense tangle of growth, thick trunks whose bark glittered in a myriad shades of green, twisting viney branches bursting with great translucent teardrop leaves which shone with an inner radiance. Dew gleamed, collected, brimmed and splashed, and not even the tiniest creature was visible.

  Bardow-

  A shock ran through him. The voice was low and quiet, a degree above a whisper, yet there was power in it and something womanly...

  Bardow, son of my daughters, custodian of the embers of the fire that was, hear me, I implore you. The dangers are greater than you know, greater than you can imagine. The Lord of Twilight's dark plans are working themselves into the flesh of the world like poison barbs. If you are not wary, your plans will become as his and all of life will be in danger.