The End of Magic

by James Mallory

  He wished for so many things that night. He wished he had been a better person when he’d had the chance. He wished he’d helped Merlin more when he’d had the power. He wished he’d been clever enough to know that this day would come, and to somehow spirit Morgan away when there was still time.

  He wished he’d never met Queen Mab at all.

  The folk of Fairy do not cry as mortalkind understands the word. Their tears are shed for malice, or magic. But Frik wept now, understanding the impossibility of gaining the only thing he had left to desire. How could one de-magic’d gnome destroy the Queen of the Old Ways? Merlin had magic—a considerable amount of it, in fact—and he had never managed to defeat her. Though Frik felt this latest plan of hers would only end in disaster, he was quite certain that Mab would come out of it all right.

  And that was something he found unbearable.

  When morning came, Frik found flint and steel and kindled Morgan’s funeral pyre. Fire was the simplest magic, but even that was beyond him now. When the pyre was burning brightly, he turned and walked out of Tintagel for the last time.

  By the time he reached the causeway the fire had begun to spread, for Tintagel, like most castles, contained as much timber as stone. When the fire had consumed all it could, all that would be left was a tumble of old stones, with no one to say what they were or who had once lived here.

  Turning his back on the flames, Frik walked on, his mind fixed on Mab’s destruction.

  There must be a way.

  He would find it.

  With time.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE BATTLE OF SHADOWS

  Mab and Mordred rode away from Tintagel, and as they went, Mordred slowly became aware of things around him that he had never seen before. There were tiny winged women who flitted through the air around him, clad only in a bright rainbow of colored lights, gnarled old dwarves in green coats and red caps who crouched by the roots of trees and watched them ride by. Even the horses were transformed, until Mab rode a shining silver mare and Mordred rode a gleaming black stallion.

  At last he was going to the Land of Magic. There Mab would give him the gifts she had always promised him, the gifts that would enable him to destroy his father and all his father’s works.

  Around the two riders the land slowly changed from the tree-dotted green fields of Cornwall to rolling hills covered with white trefoil blossoms and pale heather. The sky was the silvery grey of mist, and though Mordred looked carefully, he could see no brighter spot where the sun might be shining beyond the mist. The only sparks of color came from the flying sprites. Mordred swatted at one that flew too close, and was pleased to feel his hand connect solidly with the tiny body. He heard its thin wail as it sailed through the air to land heavily against the ground.

  “Now Mordred,” Mab said, “you mustn’t be rude. These will be your subjects someday.”

  “If they’re to be my subjects, then that means I may do just as I like with them,” Mordred said logically. But the sprites steered clear of him for the rest of the ride.

  Soon they reached a place where an immense stone henge had been erected, gigantic pillars of pale granite set in a ring, with stone lintels laid across them so that the structure resembled nothing so much as an enormous ring of cyclopean doorways leading to unknown destinations.

  “This is the way into the Land of Magic,” Mab said proudly.

  She gestured, and the doorways filled with rainbow fire. Through them, Mordred could see visions—of marching armies, of strange weapons, of machines that flew through the sky spewing fire.

  War.

  He liked it.

  Mordred smiled. “Which door shall we choose, Auntie?” he asked eagerly.

  Mab did not answer, but rode forward, through a door that showed Romans fending off blue-painted savages who fought with clubs and spears. Mordred eagerly spurred his own horse after her, but once he had ridden through the gate, the warriors vanished.

  Mordred stood beside Mab in the center of a silver path that arced through a vast cavern. He could hear the sound of water lapping somewhere far below, but the cave was so dark that he could not see it. All around him, the walls glittered with a dull crystalline shine, and in the distance he could hear a faint chiming.

  This is rather disappointing, Mordred thought privately. Frankly, he’d been expecting something more impressive than a cave.

  “I have brought you Mordred!” Mab cried, throwing her arms wide. Her shout echoed through the vast cavern. “Come, Mordred. We have much to do.”

  She took his hand, and suddenly the two of them were in a completely different place. This is more like it, Mordred thought. The room had a fireplace, a table, and chairs, but what it had most of was books, large dusty impressive-looking tomes that probably contained all manner of vile spells. Mab ripped through them with her customary destructiveness, flinging them from the shelves and tossing them aside as she searched for a particular object.

  “Ah,” Mab said at last, turning toward Mordred with a small black glass bottle in her hand. “Here it is.”

  Mordred regarded the bottle with interest. Whatever was inside seemed to be glowing.

  She pulled out the stopper before seizing a battered and tarnished silver goblet from the top of a shelf. She poured it full from the bottle—the liquid did glow, then began to bubble and smoke. She handed the goblet to Mordred.

  “Drink this,” Mab said. “With its power you will be able to persuade anyone mortal of anything.”

  Mordred stared down into the goblet. “And why would I want to do that, Auntie?” Persuasion hadn’t actually been in any of his future plans.

  “You will turn Arthur’s knights against him, and use them to destroy Camelot and all that it stands for!” Mab cawed in her raven’s voice. “And then Merlin will see that it was wrong to oppose me!”

  “But aren’t we going to destroy Merlin too, Auntie?” Mordred asked. He sat down in a large ornate chair, brushing away a few cobwebs first. The goblet he held still bubbled and foamed.

  “Leave Merlin to me,” Mab said. “I’ve made plans that will remove him from the World of Men completely. He will be powerless to help Arthur.”

  “That’s all very well,” Mordred said, getting up again and walking over to where Mab stood, “but don’t you want him dead? Auntie? Tell your favorite nephew.”

  “Merlin is a wizard,” Mab said. “He has the Old Blood running through his veins. The potion’s powers won’t affect him. I don’t want you to fail, Mordred,” she said, turning to him and stroking his cheek. “You mean so much to me.”

  But not as much as Merlin does, Mordred thought with an unwelcome pang of realization. He’d always known that Mab had created Merlin. But Merlin had betrayed her, and Mordred had been sure that Mab had written Merlin off years ago.

  Suddenly he wasn’t so sure anymore.

  “Drink,” Mab urged him.

  Mordred did, cautiously. Despite the fact that the goblet in his hands was hot, the liquid it contained was cold—bitingly cold. It burned freezingly all the way down his throat, numbing his mouth and tongue. He coughed and sputtered, dropping the cup.

  “I don’t feel any different,” he said when he could speak.

  Mab patted his shoulder. “It won’t begin to work until you return to the mortal world—but beware. Its power will wane with the waning of the year. At Samhain it will end.”

  “That should be plenty of time,” Mordred said complacently. “Now. What other presents do you have for me, Auntie?”

  Once he left Tintagel Keep, the now-mortal Frik wandered helplessly—aimlessly—through a world grown dark and cruel. He had thought that there could be nothing worse than to be Mab’s eternal victim, but he had been wrong. Stripped of the magic that had been his since the beginning of Time, he was forced to fight for his survival in a world where his gnomish appearance made him every man and woman’s enemy. There were times when Frik, tired, hungry, and cold, yearned simply to lie down in a ditch and le
t Lord Idath take him away to the Land of Winter.

  But he wouldn’t. Not while Mab was larking around, gloating over her hopeful victories. There must be some way to stop the old besom!

  There was no one he could turn to for help, no one left alive who would look kindly upon him, save for one man.

  Merlin the wizard.

  Down deep inside himself, Frik cringed at the thought. He could not bear to accept Merlin’s forgiveness when he could not forgive himself. But Merlin would understand his grief. Merlin would help him. The boy had a kind and generous heart, and was dedicated to Mab’s destruction. Merlin would forgive Frik his part in all the abuse and maltreatment he had suffered in the service of Mab’s ambition.

  And it was time to face facts. Frik had nowhere to go and no one to turn to but Merlin. Perhaps between the two of them, they could think of something that could destroy the powerful Queen of the Old Ways. Almost despite himself, Frik’s faltering steps turned north, toward the forest where Merlin had been born.

  We had some happy times here, Frik thought to himself as he surveyed the little forest hut. It wasn’t kept quite as it had been in Ambrosia’s time—when Frik had been a frequent, though invisible, visitor—but it was tidy enough. All right and tight, waiting for the day that Merlin would come back to it.

  Frik sat down on a stool and stared morosely into the cold hearth. The harsh wind of autumn blew through the chinks in the thatching, and Frik shivered in his threadbare mountebank’s costume. He was cold—and try as he might, no amount of will could light a fire in the fireplace, or even generate a little heat. Life wasn’t much fun without magic… and yet Merlin had struggled so hard against it, both against learning it and against using it.

  It was very puzzling.

  Frik’s shoulders slumped. There was no point in putting off the horrid realization any longer. Merlin wasn’t here. Part of Frik had known all along that he wouldn’t be. Merlin would be at Camelot—and soon, so would Mordred, armed with all of Mab’s venomous ingenuity. Frik had come on a fool’s errand—but down deep inside, a small voice insisted that there was something he needed to do here in Barnstable Forest. Something important. Something vital.

  Frik gazed bleakly about the hut. Little curls of autumn leaf had blown in under the tattered door curtain, and spiders had strung veils of lace between the shelves and along the walls. The little cottage had the look of a place that had been abandoned forever, but surely that could not be true. This was Merlin’s home. He loved the forest and the wild lands. He must be planning to return here.

  When?

  When Arthur was dead and Mordred ruled in Camelot? When Mab had won? Even if Merlin were willing to abandon his vendetta against her, Mab wouldn’t just let Merlin walk away. She was too vengeful for that. She would want her renegade wizard to bow down, to acknowledge her supremacy—and, try as he might, Frik could not imagine Master Merlin doing that.

  Unfortunately, Frik couldn’t imagine Merlin winning a battle against Mab either. Mab was an elemental force of nature, the Queen of the Old Ways. No mere human—or half-fay wizard—could destroy her, not when she drew her power from human belief. Only when every last one of them had forgotten her would she lose her malign potency.

  Frik put his head in his hands and thought longingly once more of Lord Idath and his soft dark all-comforting cloak. In the Summerland there was no cold, no hunger, and no pain. Frik was sure that he would not mind being dead very much. And surely Lord Idath would have to take him in. He was mortal now, after all. And all that was mortal were Lord Idath’s subjects.

  Frik gazed woefully around himself, self-pitying thoughts of Mab’s invincibility and Lord Idath’s kingdom swirling together in his mind. And suddenly he realized why he’d come here, why he’d never quite despaired in all the long days since Morgan’s murder. There was something here that could help him destroy Mab.

  Slowly Frik got to his feet, pacing around the interior of the hut, casting his mind back through the years. As if it were yesterday, he remembered the day Merlin had escaped from the Land Under Hill back into the mortal world and Mab had gone in search of him. She had returned in a terrible temper—alone—vowing vengeance against Merlin for betraying her, and Frik had not dared to ask her what had happened that day in the World of Men. But later, when her anger had cooled, Mab had boasted of the things she had done that day in the forest to hurt Merlin. She had boasted of her part in Ambrosia’s death.

  And of what she had done to Herne.

  Once, like Ambrosia, Herne had been a cleric of the Old Ways, serving Lord Idath in his aspect as Lord of the Wild Things. But as Vortigern’s oppression had grown, Herne had set aside his priestly horned crown to become the champion of the people, feeding the hungry and protecting the weak from his home here in the greenwood. Herne had watched over young Merlin as he grew up here within the forest, and when Ambrosia had been killed, Herne had tried to save Merlin from Mab’s vengeance, only to be destroyed for his efforts. But even though he had renounced his ancient power and priesthood, Herne had given Mab quite a fright, Frik knew, for Herne had still held the Horn of Idath, one of the thirteen sacred treasures of Britain, and even Mab could not stand against its effects.

  So long as all thirteen of the treasures existed, the realm of Britain would endure no matter what evils beset it. Aeons ago most of the treasures had been lost to their ancient guardians. The Horn of Idath was one of those few treasures that remained visible in the mortal world. Only a Lord of Fairy, such as Herne had been—or a great wizard—could sound this horn, but once it was blown, it had the power to strike terror into those who heard it, to suspend time… or to call its maker, the Lord of Winter, to aid the wielder.

  Herne was dead. But Merlin still remained.

  A giddy wave of hope washed over Frik, forcing him to sit down for a moment. Mab had taken the Horn from Herne, but she had not dared to bring it back with her to the Land of Magic, for then Idath, its master, would have known where it was—and asked Mab some very awkward questions, Frik was sure.

  And so Mab had hidden it here, somewhere in the forest. If Frik could only find it, and bring it to Merlin, the wizard would at last possess a weapon that even Queen Mab feared.

  All Frik had to do was find it.

  In the days that followed, Mab showed Mordred all the secrets of her underground dominion. Mordred feigned appreciation, and never let Mab suspect the fury that was slowly growing deep inside him.

  She was going to spare Merlin. Her firstborn—the wizard whose malfeasance had caused Mab to create Mordred.

  Mordred could not remember how long he’d known he was competing with Merlin for Mab’s affection. She’d always called Merlin her enemy, but Mordred, even as a child, had known better. Mab wasn’t finished with Merlin. She’d forgive him in an instant if he came back to her, and then where would Mordred be? He wasn’t a wizard. He didn’t have any of the Old Blood. While Merlin was alive, he was second best.

  It was intolerable.

  In a just world, matters would have righted themselves naturally. Mordred would have killed Merlin, and eliminated his rival for Auntie Mab’s affections. She’d always promised him that he’d get to do that just as soon as he grew up.

  But now she’d changed her mind. Now she was planning to hide Merlin somewhere else while Mordred got rid of dear Father and that trollop he’d married. Once he’d seen the full extent of her power, of course Merlin would want to return to Mab, and then Mab would love him best… and where would that leave Mordred?

  Obviously, this could not be allowed to happen. And so Mordred would learn all Mab could teach him, take all the weapons she was willing to give him, and use the power he gained in ways she had never imagined. Arthur would die—and so would Merlin, no matter where Mab hid him.

  It would all be for the best.

  She’d see.

  He searched in the high branches of trees, under thorn-bushes, beneath the surface of ice-crusted woodland pools, in an ever-widening spi
ral that had Ambrosia’s cottage as its center. The search was tedious, and Frik was never afterward quite certain of how long it took him, only that the forest turned from autumn brown to winter grey while he searched. The Horn of Idath was here. He knew it. And he would find it, even if he had to sift through every scrap of the detritus of thirty winters.

  If Frik had still been able to call upon even a scrap of magic, the search would have been quick and simple, but Frik was as helpless now as any human, and far less used to managing things without the power of magic. Frik was—had been—a creature of magic. Without it Frik was not a normal mortal, but a crippled gnome. He felt the loss of his powers keenly.

  But even though Frik was now mortal and magicless, he still had the ageless patience of fairykind. And at last he found what he sought.

  The Horn of Idath was wedged high in the branches of an oak tree. The tree’s wood had grown tight around it, and in any other season it would have been invisible. But in winter the gleam of gold and gems stood out brightly against the grey bark. He had not quite believed it was here, but he had also not dared to doubt.

  Carefully Frik climbed the tree, and worked patiently with a small knife he had found in the forest cottage until he had freed the Horn from the wood. It had snowed last night, and it had begun to snow again as he worked, but Frik noticed neither the cold nor the fat wet flakes that mantled his shoulders and crusted his eyelashes. All he could see or think about was the Horn. Now at last it was in his possession. Its magic made his fingers tingle.

  He climbed stiffly down from his precarious perch and stood at the base of the tree, holding the recovered Horn in his two hands. It was a huntsman’s horn, with a long strap of gilded leather attached so it could be slung over the shoulder. Frik had seen Herne carry it that way so many times as he watched Merlin grow up here. Its mouthpiece was gold, and the white curve of the Horn was banded in gold, the bands studded with emeralds, sapphires, and opals.