Tracing the Shadow

by Sarah Ash

  Kaspar Linnaius stared down at the twisted pieces of his Vox Aethyria. That arrogant fool of a green-eyed boy had undone all his plans. Why had he ever agreed to take him on as his apprentice? He should have known the boy would cause trouble. Was it because he had seen something of his younger self in that wan face? When the waif had arrived drenched at the college door one wet, windy autumn night, his unkempt brown hair plastered to his head by the driving rain, his thin face dominated by those huge, pleading eyes of green, he had remembered from over a hundred years ago what it felt like to trudge for weeks on end, always hungry, shunned and rejected for being “different”…

  Linnaius brought his clenched fist down on his desk. What was he doing, allowing sentimental memories to cloud his judgment? Am I turning into Gonery? He had finally run out of patience with his headstrong, ambitious apprentice.

  Yet Rieuk Mordiern made the Vox work.

  The delicate metal spindles, cogs, and shafts wavered, blurring together as he stared at them. A mist was obscuring his vision. The tightness in his chest increased and he felt himself fighting for breath.

  I’m spent. I used too much of my power in Enhirre and I’m fading…

  With great effort, he rose to his feet, the laboratory jars swimming before his eyes as he struggled toward the door. He caught sight of himself in the mirror and saw that his hair had turned as white as thistledown.

  In the echoing hallway he passed Goustan de Rhuys, who gazed at him with concern.

  “Kaspar, are you all right? You look…”

  “Old?” Linnaius managed a wry grimace. “Tell Gonery I’m off to Maistre Guirec. Nothing can be done to repair the Vox till he’s made new parts…”

  “This stone is no ordinary crystal, is it, Kaspar?” Magister Gonery held the jewel up to the light, turning it round and round.

  Kaspar Linnaius let out a grunt. “Damn it, Gonery, did you think I’d forgotten that the Vox is all that’s keeping the Inquisition at bay? But every crystal Hervé and I tried just didn’t work. I had to go a long way to find one that was a little…different.” Exhaustion overcame him; he sank down into a chair.

  “A little too different, as it turned out. What in the name of the five elements is it?”

  “It’s an aethyr crystal.”

  Gonery raised one wispy eyebrow. “And how exactly did you come by it?”

  “It’s better you don’t know.” Linnaius had expended too much of his remaining strength. Weakened by the long, wind-tossed flight from Ondhessar, he wasn’t sure how long he would last.

  “Kaspar?” said Gonery warningly. He put the stone down. “What have you done to yourself? You look so ill.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Linnaius lightly, “I made certain it would be very hard for anyone to follow me.” The daylight seemed to fade from the room; when he blinked, he found he was lying on the floor of the study, with Gonery hovering anxiously over him.

  “You need rest, Kaspar. Let Hervé and Rieuk repair the Vox.”

  “Don’t—let—that—damned apprentice anywhere near my Vox,” Linnaius managed to grit out the words.

  “But you said yourself that Rieuk made it work.”

  “He’s an elemental. I suspected as much, but now we’ve proof absolute. He doesn’t know his own strength. He’s a danger to himself and everyone else.”

  “Rather like you, many years ago, hm?” Gonery reminded him mildly.

  Linnaius allowed Gonery to help him to sit up but ignored the last remark. “I may be away for a while,” he said, rising unsteadily to his feet. He felt as if a thin transparent veil had unfurled between him and the world around him, muffling sounds, dampening the brightness of the light of day. “My faculties are failing. If I leave it much longer, I won’t even have the strength to reach the Jade Springs.”

  “So even the Elixir has its limits?”

  “I hear that the waters of Lake Taigal are exceptionally good for the health. Quite rejuvenating, in fact,” said Linnaius, slowly making his way to the door.

  Rieuk’s attic room was situated at the top of the student wing of the college, looking out over the little town of Karantec below, its central street winding down the hill to the sleepy green waters of the River Faou. The younger students slept in a dormitory on the first floor, but the older apprentices—Deniel, Madoc, and Rieuk—were each allotted his own study, on the top attic floor of the ancient building. Swallows nested under the eaves and he could hear their incessant twittering as they skimmed in on swift-scissoring wings to feed their young.

  Rieuk threw himself down on the bed and lay there, hands behind his head, glowering at the dawn sky. He had been up half the night cleaning Magister de Maunoir’s study. He was past exhaustion now, trembling with self-righteous anger.

  “The spirit should be mine. I divined it. I drew it out. So what if I didn’t have the power to hold it, to bend it to my will? They could have taught me how. But no! A mere apprentice can’t be trusted with an aethyrial spirit.”

  At the very moment when he had sensed the spirit’s life energy, he had also glimpsed what it could be like to wield such power. It was as if a charge of lightning had coursed through his body. And then, when he saw it…Pale as the crystal that had birthed it, its unearthly beauty had taken his breath away. He had never encountered any creature like this before—nor heard such a terrible raw keening, that tore through his whole being until he felt as if he were being ripped apart, vein by vein, sinew by sinew. That was when he had lost control, when he had dropped to his knees, hands clutched to his throbbing ears.

  At the very moment when he should have used his skills to bind the spirit, he had failed. He had not realized how powerful it would be. And that was when Hervé de Maunoir had stepped in. Somewhere at the back of his mind, a reasoning voice reminded Rieuk that had he not done so, the spirit would have disappeared back inside the aethyr—or, worse still, have wreaked mindless devastation within the cottage, attacking the one who had dared to drag it into the mortal world.

  “If we hadn’t sealed it within that book, it would have rent you in bloody fragments,” Hervé de Maunoir had said in his habitual matter-of-fact way.

  So you sealed it, Magister de Maunoir. My aethyrial spirit is trapped in your book.

  Rieuk could not stop thinking of it. He hated the way the magisters had reminded him of his lack of experience, his need to gain the wisdom and knowledge that would make him strong enough to control such a power. He hated the fact that they had made him feel gauche and inadequate.

  And why was a spirit trapped in that crystal, anyway? Where exactly did my master find it?

  Suddenly he became aware that the swallows had fallen silent. The air felt heavy, as if a storm was looming. Rieuk, puzzled, rolled off his bed and went to the window to look out. High above in the cloudy sky, he spotted the faint silhouette of a hawk slowly circling the college. Even as he gazed up at it, the hawk wheeled around and lazily winged away. Within moments, the swallow chicks began to chirp again and the parents returned, darting in, swift and accurate as arrows to their target.

  “You’re talented, Rieuk. But it doesn’t take talent alone to make an alchymist.” Magister Gonery leaned forward over his cluttered desk and gazed earnestly into Rieuk’s eyes. And although the elderly alchymist’s mild expression appeared solicitous, Rieuk was not fooled. “You want too much too soon. You cut corners, take risks. You leave yourself vulnerable to unscrupulous influences.”

  “But I have a gift with crystals,” Rieuk blurted out. “I made the Vox work. Why doesn’t my master let me use my gift? Why doesn’t he trust me?”

  “Your gift drew you here. But it also draws you to the attention of others. Others who would use you and your gift for their own selfish ends.”

  Rieuk felt a muscle twitch involuntarily in his cheek and hoped Magister Gonery had not noticed. His uncanny ability to read even the most well-guarded thoughts never failed to unnerve his students.

  “They will promise you the things you m
ost desire. And then, before you know what you have done, you will find yourself in thrall. Sealed into a contract that binds you until death—and beyond.”

  Rieuk had heard this lecture many times before. But this time he feared it was the prelude to his expulsion.

  Magister Gonery let out a sigh. “As I said—had you been paying attention—we all recognize that you have the gift. And a gift such as yours is all too rare these days. But it is still raw and ill controlled. If Magister de Maunoir had not been there to contain that aethyrial spirit, it would have escaped and wreaked havoc.” He removed his spectacles and began to polish a lens on his sleeve. “And worst of all, I’ve had to contend with a stream of complaints from the good citizens of Karantec. Even the mayor.” He picked up a sheaf of letters on his desk and waved them in front of Rieuk. “I can’t let the irresponsible act of one of my students tarnish the college’s reputation. Especially in these troubled times.”

  Rieuk swallowed down the lump in his throat. Here it comes. The end of my career.

  “Magister Linnaius is adamant that you should be expelled. But I’m putting you on probation until I’ve consulted with the other magisters. If—and I repeat, if—any one of them is willing to take you on as his apprentice, I’ll grant you a second chance. Of course, you’ll have to repeat the final year’s work.”

  “But Magister Linnaius will influence them. No one will want to—”

  A stern look from Magister Gonery silenced him. “And you’re banned from all the college laboratories until I’ve met with the others to discuss your case.”

  “Banned?”

  “You will make yourself useful in other ways, running errands and repairing the damage at Magister de Maunoir’s house. And to start with, I’m sending you on an errand.”

  Rieuk was not listening with full attention; he was seething with self-righteous indignation. So now he was to be used as an errand boy?

  “It will give you the chance to reflect upon the foolishness of your actions. And it will put a little distance between you and your master.”

  “Where are you sending me?” Rieuk said sullenly.

  “Magister Linnaius has an arrangement with a skilled horloger in Kemper, one Maistre Guirec.”

  Rieuk remembered the name. “The one who made the parts for the Vox?”

  “The very same. Your master has already ordered new parts. You are to collect them from Sieur Guirec. He’s bringing them to Karantec.”

  “And my master trusts me with this errand?” Rieuk muttered.

  “I trust you.” Gonery’s rheumy eyes suddenly gleamed with a clear light that pierced Rieuk to the core; caught off guard, he staggered and took a step back. “Your master has other matters on his mind at present. Don’t let me down, Rieuk. This is your last chance.”

  Inquisitor Visant gazed around the interior of the chapel of Saint Argantel’s Seminary with a coldly critical eye. He noted an ancient polychrome statue of the patron saint, lit by the uncertain daylight, but nothing else of architectural distinction.

  “So this is where you spent your school days, Maistre Donatien? I understand your affection for the place,” he added dryly, “but I’m a busy man; was it really necessary to drag me along on your nostalgic journey?”

  Grand Maistre Donatien rose from his knees and turned around from the altar, smiling. “Touché, Inquisitor. But there’s much more to this chapel than schoolboy memories. I’d never have brought you and your men here if it were not on a matter of the utmost importance.”

  “And the utmost confidentiality?”

  “I’ve received an urgent request for help from our Guerriers in Enhirre. It seems that a certain Kaspar Linnaius, citizen of Francia, violated the Shrine at Ondhessar, stealing a sacred stone. But at last we have proof positive that Linnaius is a magus: He escaped in a flying craft. We have witnesses, Alois.”

  Visant regarded Donatien without commenting; there had been many bizarre rumors about Linnaius before but never evidence such as this.

  “Captain de Lanvaux was injured trying to hold the craft down; he was dragged several feet into the air before the Magus forced him to let go.”

  “So you want me to arrest Linnaius?”

  “Not just Linnaius, but all of his colleagues at the College of Thaumaturgy. They call themselves ‘alchymists.’ They claim that they’re working on scientific experiments. And now,” he said triumphantly, “we have proof that they’re practicing the Forbidden Arts.”

  “But if the magi at Karantec are practicing the Forbidden Arts, we’ll need more than a company of Guerriers to arrest them.”

  Donatien beckoned him toward the altar. “Have you ever heard of Argantel’s Angelstones?”

  Visant shook his head.

  “We’ve gone to great lengths to keep them a well-guarded secret, even within the Commanderie. Until today, only the Grand Maistres have known their hiding place. But I think I can trust you, Inquisitor,” Donatien said, with a knowing little smile, “not to divulge their whereabouts to another living soul, can’t I?”

  He knelt before the altar and took a golden key from a chain around his neck. Visant saw him press in turn a sequence of carved images on the altar: Sergius’s crook; Mhir’s rose; seven stars for the Seven Heavenly Guardians. With a creak, a little aperture opened below the seven stars, revealing a second, concealed door. Donatien inserted the key, turning it left, then right, then left again. From within the cavity behind the second door, he drew out a wooden box, which he placed on the altar, using the key to unlock it.

  Fascinated, Visant drew closer. “Angelstones?” Clear as polished drops of ice, the stones glittered in their plain wooden setting.

  “Seven crystals…but not of this world. They were given to Saint Argantel by the Angel Lord Galizur as protection against daemons. If a daemon is close by, a streak of darkness sullies the clarity of the crystal.”

  “But how will this protect us against Kaspar Linnaius and the other magi?”

  “If Linnaius is a true magus, his powers are daemonic in origin. The Angelstones will counteract those powers and render him helpless.”

  Visant looked at the crystals. It was difficult to imagine that such pretty gems could subdue a magus wielding the Forbidden Arts. “You said there were seven. I see only five.”

  “Nothing escapes you, does it?” Donatien said with a little laugh. “We were forced to employ two to defeat the magi of Ondhessar. And even now we can’t be certain that some didn’t escape.”

  “But how can I be sure that they will protect my men?” Skeptical by nature, Visant could not help but feel reluctant to put his trust in Donatien’s angelic legacy.

  “Each stone was imbued with angelic power by one of the Heavenly Guardians.” A faint luminescence from the crystals illuminated Donatien’s face as his fingers hovered above the precious stones, as if pondering which one to select. “But once used, that power is exhausted. The crystals of Cassiel and Dahariel are empty now. But one should be sufficient to quell the magi of Karantec. I think this one should serve your purposes well enough; the stone of Ardarel, Lord of Heavenly Fire.”

  Visant took the stone from Donatien. For a moment, he thought he caught a faint shimmer of flame at its heart—or could it have been a trick of the light? “In Sergius’s name, this Angelstone had better work, Maistre,” he said dryly. “For if the magi fight back using the Forbidden Arts, my men and I are as good as dead.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Rieuk set out into the town, head down, scowling.

  So this is how Gonery means to punish me, treating me as an errand boy, forcing me to fetch and carry like a common servant? And what character-improving lesson am I supposed to learn from this humiliation?

  It was all very well for Magister Gonery to warn him of the unscrupulous who lurked in dark corners, waiting to rape him of his talent. Wasn’t that precisely what Kaspar Linnaius had done?

  It was my gift that divined the spirit imprisoned in the crystal, it was my “raw talent” that
drew it out into the mortal world. I made the Vox Aethyria work—and yet Linnaius will take all the glory. He kicked angrily at a loose stone, sending it ricocheting down the cobbled lane.

  The sun was sinking as he crossed the old stone bridge that spanned the meandering River Faou, turning the water to violet and gold. The darkening air was still heavy with the day’s heat, and swallows swooped low over the shallows, feasting on midges. A serving girl was standing on tiptoe to light the lanterns that hung outside the ivied door of the tavern. As each flame glowed to life, Rieuk saw velvety white moths flitting through the soft twilight, drawn to the brightness. He stopped beneath one of the lanterns to look again at his instructions:

  “Ask for Anselm Guirec the Horloger.”

  A lively babble of voices issued from inside. Rieuk disliked meeting new people, and he especially disliked being forced to seek out a complete stranger. The stink of ale and wine fumes made him wrinkle his nose in disgust, and the fug of the smoky air tickled the back of his throat.

  A group of drinkers broke into roars of laughter as he walked past. Are they laughing at me? And how, in God’s name, am I supposed to find Guirec in this throng?

  “You are looking for Sieur Guirec?”

  Rieuk started, caught off guard. A man had appeared beside him out of the gloom. He was tall, dressed in a long traveling coat of charcoal grey, his straight black hair loosely tied back at the nape of his neck with a slender bronze ribbon of silk. He wore gold-rimmed spectacles whose cloudy lenses seemed to hide rather than reveal the dark eyes behind. Rieuk’s first impression was that he had more the air of a lawyer or a priest than a clockmaker.

  “You’re not Sieur Guirec.”