The Daemon Prism: A Novel of the Collegia Magica

by Carol Berg

  “Take this fool down,” said the broker, or whatever he was. “Then we’ll see who’s cowering in the cleft he’s guarding.”

  At the first scrape of swords, de Santo dragged me faster, no longer concerned with noise.

  I pulled back. “We cannot leave him—”

  The captain crushed me to the wall. “Arrows from atop the cliffs felled a dozen Temple bailiffs. These swordsmen mocked the Saints Awaiting and called upon them to show themselves or betake themselves to their true master in the netherworld. Must I spell out Lord Ilario’s feelings about such words?”

  “No. Gods, no.”

  Ilario was a devout member of the Cult of the Reborn. I’d always thought it odd for such a flea-wit. Only he wasn’t such a flea-wit. Did he, like de Gautier and Kajetan, believe Portier a hero saint, reborn to serve humankind? Was he willing to sacrifice himself for superstition? Or for me?

  “Move,” spat de Santo.

  As many times as I’d wished Ilario muted or dead, abandoning him split my craw. But if we went back, both de Santo and Ilario would die, and these villains would have me, too, and I’d never learn what was to be learned from my father’s dream. If such was their intent, I damned well could not allow them to succeed.

  We pelted up the track as fast as my jellied knees could carry me. Behind us, Ilario’s fight involved far too many swords at much too fast a pace. Around a bend and we could no long hear it. A few steps farther and soft whinnies welcomed us to the notch where our horses cropped the tough grass.

  De Santo’s gut was as pained as mine. He near broke my wrist when I would not allow him to send Ilario’s mount back to the chevalier.

  “If we send the beast down now, the others will know we’ve gone this way,” I said. “We’ll have wasted this time he’s gifted us. If he survives, he knows where to find the beast. He’ll need it, yes? And if the chevalier doesn’t fetch his mount, we can collect it on the way back.”

  “Angels’ wretched, cursed, shite-eating mercy,” he said and hefted me onto Devil’s back.

  We rode until we emerged from the defile. Then de Santo led us afoot. Reaching deep into bone and fiber, I summoned him a light. Though he damned it as no better than a firefly’s, we crept safely across the stinking bog and into the wood. As we emerged from the patch of dry pine onto the cliffs of Tark’s Spine, the last of my power drained away. My light failed, and snow-laden gusts left de Santo as blind as me. On the point of collapse, we tethered the horses to a protruding branch and huddled in our cloaks to wait for day.

  Neither the captain nor I slept more than fitful minutes at a time. It was too cold. Too dangerous. I could not stop shivering, no matter that I stuffed every morsel of food from my pack down my gullet. Fire could bring our pursuers down on us, and neither of us was fit to piss, much less fight. The cold froze out all thought save endless repetition of the night’s strange happenings, rearranging themselves into random patterns.

  “SHELF PATH’S VISIBLE,” ANNOUNCED THE CAPTAIN, on his feet and untangling our cloaks. “Snow’s mostly blown off it and sun’s peeking through. It’ll be naught but wet before long. I’ll look ahead.”

  While he was gone, the scenes I’d conjured in the restless hours snapped together like one of Queen Eugenie’s puzzle pictures.

  “So a dozen Temple servitors arrived while you were taking care of the eight attackers in the rift,” I said, when he returned. “And they could see?”

  He hawked and spat. “We thought you’d gave us the victory. Took down all eight. Then, aye, this same Temple rabble had chased us through Jarasco came running up the road. Some were blinded like the ones we’d fought. Some could see and demanded we turn you over.”

  “And then arrows rained from the sky and killed all but two of them. So there were three separate groups. The Temple servitors behind us, the eight fighters in the rift, and this ‘broker’ and his archers on the cliff tops.” The latter had watched and waited outside the range of my enchantment. “Who were they? Did you get a look at the leader?”

  “Don’t know who they were—the ones in the rift or the ones up top. The leader was sturdy as a boar, skin blacker than my own. But neither the ones we killed nor the ones up top wore badges of any kind. One archer fell to his death, but four remained at the end, as my lord told you. The only Temple men left alive were the pair of laggards that ran off. The laggards thought the slaughter was your doing. I did, too, at first.”

  So those who had ambushed us weren’t from the Temple. And common bandits would never bother travelers on the foot track into Coverge or possess incendiary devices to confuse us. But an entrapped enchantress who preyed on dreams might. One who could learn enough from those dreams to insert my own experiences and the faces of people I knew could surely send hirelings to fetch me when I didn’t come to her by choice.…

  “So we go on,” said the captain, as I remained silent. “I am bound to you by Chevalier de Sylvae’s orders.”

  The urgency that drove me toward Raghinne had the force of a cavalry charge. Yet a swelling certainty raised such a fear in me I hated to speak it, lest speech affirm it as truth. I squeezed Anne’s nireal nestled in my pocket, its telltales of enchantment like warm feathers on my skin.

  “No. I believe this attack part of a larger scheme—the same that brought me here. To understand it, I must go on to Raghinne. But you…you have to go back.”

  “The chevalier said I wasn’t to leave you. Six year ago, he gave me a life. He and Duplais.” The captain’s graveled voice grated rougher than usual. His resentment could have lanced a boil. “And how will you piss on your own?”

  No use to mince words. “The chevalier is dead or as good as. And yes, I do regret his sacrifice…and that it was made on my behalf. But hear this, Captain. Two months ago, three people I knew appeared in a spell-wrought dream. One lies dying in Raghinne. One was Duplais, who hides in Abidaijar, yet whom I’ve not heard from since that day. The third was Anne de Vernase. The damoselle is a woman of…extraordinary…gifts. I believe her to be in mortal danger, and I suspect Chevalier de Sylvae would agree that your most important duty this day is to protect her, no matter your rightful grudge against her father. You must ride for Montclaire, Captain. Tell her everything that’s happened tonight. About the sky and the magic and the chevalier’s deeds. Have her send to Pradoverde for my notes about the dream sending. They’ll explain all I know. But she”—fear broke a cold sweat—“she must not go there herself. She must not try to find me. Take her to Merona, where the king’s men can guard her. Tell her I said—” So many things I needed to tell her. “Tell her she must focus. I’ll come to her when I can.”

  His silence near had me bellowing. But I waited.

  Abruptly, he stuffed Devil’s reins into my hand, then swung into his saddle. “No harm will come to the lady if I can do aught. The chevalier would die for her. And she’s not to blame for her parentage.”

  “Exactly so. Ride, Captain. As if your honor depends on it. As if the world’s survival depends on it.” For no explainable reason, I believed it did. “The turning to the wagon road is exactly south of the larger pool in the bog meadow, between the hillocks. Watch your back always.”

  “Aye. And Godspeed yourself, mage.”

  CHAPTER 7

  DEMESNE OF COVERGE

  The hooves faded quickly from hearing. I hung Anne’s pendant around my neck. First business, wall off my fears for her and Portier. I could do nothing more for them from here save learn what was to be learned. I promised Devil decent grazing soon, and let his warm and sturdy bulk calm me in return. Then, I drew my knife and carefully cut a few strands from his mane.

  “You’ll wait here for me, I trust,” I said. Using my staff to make sure the shelf path was clear—and solid—I climbed a few metres farther along the track, around a bend where I could no longer hear the horse’s movements. I was alone with a soughing wind, a squawking crow, and blackness. It was all I could do to keep my hand from the copper bracelet.


  Crouching low to the ground, I felt about for a fist-sized rock and set it at arm’s length. Arm outstretched, I spun slowly in place, using my finger to scribe a circle, complete when I found the rock again. A word of binding, and the enclosure settled about me like a blanket.

  I grasped a fistful of dirt and drew in the keirna of my birthplace. No fear that it had changed since I’d lived there. I doubted it had changed in a thousand years. Coal, sweat, ignorance. Harsh winter, wet summer, cabbage soup. The annual visit from the mine stewards, dressed in finery Raghinne’s women could only dream of—those who had any dreams remaining.

  Using the horse’s hair to incorporate Devil and his patience with a spooked novice, the dirt from the familiar ground, and the terror that had become a fixed part of me the night I knew de Gautier and Jacard had stolen the light forever, I wove a guide spell I hoped would get us to Raghinne. I’d be warned should the horse go astray. It helped that the road led nowhere else.

  I retreated down the path and patted Devil’s neck again. Then I felt around for a steady rock and stepped up to give myself a boost into the saddle. Awkward but sufficient.

  “So it’s just the two of us, beast.” My voice quavered like that of a grave digger on Feste Morde. “On we go.”

  Devil moved forward at a slow walk. I tried to be firm and withhold the curses that stung my throat, all the while questioning the conviction that had caused me to travel this vile road, endangering two good men. As every hour passed, the fearful dream of death and ruin took on the shape of truth. Just to think what the Temple servitors had seen: their fellows blinded, two blood-soaked warriors, a half-mad sorcerer enveloped in a column of light, and a rain of arrows from the cliff tops. They would believe every rumor they’d ever heard about the daemon mage.

  26 DESEN, EVENING

  The road wound steeply for some twenty kilometres—an eternity—to the rocky summit of Tark’s Spine before descending into the U-shaped valley where Raghinne lay. The horse’s gait and the feel of the earth told me when we reached the valley floor—as did the burgeoning whispers in my head. People were scattered throughout this region.

  With a great release, I leaned forward onto the horse’s neck. “We’ve done it, Devil. Gods’ holy hammer, you’ve brought me safe. I’ll tell your mistress she picked a fine beast. Apples and oats all winter, I swear to you.”

  So much to tell Anne when I rejoined her. I’d refused to fall into casual conversation with her these two years. I could not be her friend. She was never going to acquire the discipline she needed or to see the world in any true perspective if she held on to her womanish imaginings about her friend of the mind, as she had called me. But gods, those night hours we had talked had been so very fine. Swift roads, Calvino de Santo. And you, too, popinjay. Then I summoned discipline to bind my fear and focused my attention outward. I had no idea what to expect in Raghinne. A second trap, perhaps…

  A LEFT TURN. A PINE-SCENTED breeze that replaced the unremitting wind of the heights. Weak sunlight played on my left flank. Even without eyes, I knew exactly where I was.

  The outcropping boulders to my right had been a wonderful place for a child to play—rocks and caves that became fortifications or ships or palaces. Andero and I had called it “the fortress.” Laughable, our notion of a palace in those days: a house with two rooms or three, a whole bed for each person, a chimney, a privy inside.

  “Dante the necromancer raising ghosts again,” I murmured to Devil. Prideful to think my coming might have meaning for Andero. He was most likely an image of my father by now.

  “Dante?” As if the earth had heard my whispered word, my name echoed from the outcrop in a timbre wholly appropriate to a slab of granite. Sure-footed steps and skittering pebbles testified to a human person’s presence.

  I reined in, released the guide spell, and poured magic into the copper bracelet, squinting up at the boulders. Of all times, I needed to see.

  The rocks were not so high as I remembered. Atop them a bulky silhouette, more than two metres high, moved against the charcoal-hued world. A man, not a rock.

  “Andero?”

  “It is you, then!” He leapt across several great rocks until he was almost on a level with me.

  “What are you doing here?” I said, averting my eyes. “Playing in the fortress?”

  “Waiting for you. Gave you a sevenday, then started watching. I can spy Harrow’s Drop from the forge. Knew you’d come.”

  “Then you know me better than I know myself. A half hour since, I wasn’t sure I’d keep on.”

  A solid thud. My brother’s boots crunched on the gravel as he came round Devil’s head. “Spirits and demons, Dante. You look like the Soul­eater’s cousin. What’s happened to you?”

  Though Anne had told me the yellow-orange streaks in my eyes were no longer visible, I kept my face turned away. “More than a moment’s telling.”

  “I’ll make sure we’ve more than a moment, then. And the mage collar…I heard about it when I was hunting word of you, but to see it on you…so big…sealed forever.”

  “Proper like a beast’s,” I snapped.

  “Don’t mean to stare.” He didn’t quail. “Glimpsed ’em when I was in the legion, of course. But never so close. Never on someone I knew.”

  Of course he’d wonder. Everyone did. “It’s light. Doesn’t hurt. Itches sometimes, as if the masters who fixed it on me left a burr in it apurpose, you know. They didn’t like me. No surprise that, eh?”

  His laughter rumbled the earth. “Not a smat, little brother! Not a smat! Come, let’s share a stoup. No rush to face the lion.”

  “He’s not dead yet? He can talk?” I’d explode a mountain if I’d come all this way only to find Da unable to answer my questions.

  “Aye. He lives. Just asleep.”

  Sagging in relief, I thanked Devil with a pat and bade Ilario and

  de Santo Godspeed yet again.

  My brother grabbed Devil’s bridle and, without further discussion, led us down the track into the village.

  An advantage of my state: I didn’t have to look on the black-dusted blight of a valley that must once have been fair and green. I’d spent a number of days in my youth imagining Raghinne scoured of rock dumps and ash heaps, iron carts, timber slabs, jacks, frames, and the pocked ugliness of abandoned pits, shafts, and spoil heaps. It shivered me a little to think I now had the power to cleanse it. But the place would remain a blackened scar. No sorcerer had power enough to restore what had been destroyed.

  “We’ve a real hostel now,” said Andero, as he led Devil into a hay-scented shelter. “Only one room over Grev’s house and the common room in the front, but he has this horse shed, a bit of grass out the back, and the best cider in Raghinne. His wife makes a fine douple and a decent pie if you’re hungry, but her fish tastes like old boots. Do you remember Grev Tey? It’s his place.”

  “Never knew him.”

  “Let me fetch his boy to see to this fine fellow.” He smoothed Devil’s shoulder.

  Dismounted, I yet held tight to the saddle. My legs were porridge. Partly from the long, terrifying ride. But also because I was pouring every smat of my power into the copper bracelet. To walk this road a cripple would be unbearable.

  Andero returned with a boy who grunted with a sullen air and took charge of Devil. “Come on, then,” said my brother. “Ale or cider?”

  “Cider.” Gritting my teeth, I clutched my staff and followed his bulky shadow across a yard that slurped at my boots. Up two steps and through a gaping doorway. So far, so good.

  The place smelled as any common room—of cider, ale, smoke, and charred fat, laced with mud and sweat. But this was Raghinne, so the smoke stank of sulfur and every surface was gritty with cinders.

  Andero left me at a plank table and returned a short time later, thumping a heavy cup in front of me. “Grev will bring you supper. You look

  all in.”

  As my brother took the stool across from me, I tried with all I had to see
what manhood had written on his face. His youthful mien had been broad, fair, and open. My time here might depend on the change. But it was no good. I thanked him for the stoup, drank deep of the thin, biting cider, and fixed my gaze on the slab of night that was the table. With a touch of the copper bracelet and a whispered word, I was blind again.

  “Are you all right, little brother?”

  “It’s a harder trek than I remembered,” I said. “So tell me, how is it with all of you?”

  “Da’s for the Souleater at any hour. Burnt awful. Lungs ruint. Healer says there’s not enough left to mend. Sheer meanness keeps him this side the Veil.” He sighed. “It’ll be a relief for Mam when he’s done. He’s not mellowed these past years and was a raving loony in the days before the blowout.”

  I held off questions about the dreams. Better to learn what I faced between here and Da’s bedside. “What of the others?”