The House of the Stag

by Kage Baker

  Magister Paglatha taught him the spells that required sacrifices and led him down to the pens from which suitable victims were chosen. Now Gard must in horror choose between manacled slaves condemned to death and idiot children kept penned like animals. No demons were here, for only a true death imparted any virtue to a spell; and Magister Paglatha explained that careful discernment was required in the choice of a victim.

  Magic, he explained, as any other endeavor, required certain expenditures. A fire must have fuel to burn, a child must have food to grow; so any spell must feed on thaumic energy. Energy might be generated in several ways, but the most reliable was by sacrifice. An object might be sacrificed. A virtue might be sacrificed. Best of all, in terms of the power it generated, a life might be sacrificed.

  The slaves might be more robust, but brought only the crudest energy to spell work. The imbeciles, on the other hand, being of the masters’ own noble blood, made a more perfect and poignant sacrifice. Moreover, said Magister Paglatha, their use in this way made for excellent thrift.

  Gard could not bring himself to reach in among the children, where they mewled and rocked themselves to and fro. He pointed instead at the condemned slaves, and one was hauled forth for his use.

  He was relieved when they apprenticed him at last to Magister Prazza, whose specialty was the summoning and embodiment of demons.

  In Magister Prazza’s casting chamber, a great book contained all the true names of demons bound to the mountain, with colored ribbons beside those that had lately been slain in the arena. Magister Prazza, who was small and bent and scarcely able to speak above a whisper, taught Gard the formulas for calling them back from their brief freedom. Demons must be lured; they must be caught and held by certain signs. The more powerful ones must be cajoled and promised pleasures.

  Before any such negotiation, bodies must be made ready for them, out of a certain dense clay brought up from the depths in great tubs. Gard learned to sculpt bone and sinew, organs and flesh, and was now grateful for what he had learned in Magister Hoptriot’s dissecting chamber. Carefully he gave his figures strong limbs, eyes and tongues, anything he would not want to lack himself; bitterly he regretted his mistakes, when the clay transmuted and a new-bodied demon would limp away from him on legs of unequal length or gasp openmouthed for want of nostrils.

  Overall, however, Gard showed great aptitude in this field. Magister Prazza grew cordial with so promising a student, and loaned him scrolls on the subject of advanced divination techniques for learning the true names of demons. By this means Balnshik, far too old and wise to be tricked into telling her name, had nonetheless been caught by her master, though her name was not in the Slave Inventory; Magister Pread jealously kept it secret. Gard took the scrolls back to his rooms—for he had now been granted a suite of his own, adjoining Lady Pirihine’s—and studied them closely.

  Late one night he retreated to his inmost room and improvised a casting chamber, muffling the walls with black drapes. Certain circles within circles he chalked on the floor; certain incense he cast on coals, prudently setting the brazier under a vent lest he die like a fool of asphyxiation. An offering of wine Gard set out. Last of all he took an athalme and gashed his arm, and let the blood drops fall on certain characters he had chalked within the circle.

  He sat without the circle, focused, and went out of himself. Rising above, he called. Out across the void of light, he called, and the shifting star clouds heard him. Some echoed him. He called, insistent. At last one across the infinite distance turned, as though curious. Gard had no name for her, but he called with his shed blood, and that was enough to pull her to him; for the blood had once run in her own veins.

  Gard opened his eyes. He saw the veiled light trapped within his chalked circle, spinning, shifting, a blur the color of blossoms and flesh. Now and again some of it coalesced into images: a hand, a hundred hands, an eye, teeth, a pair of legs, a profile. Gard caught his breath as he recognized the face. It resembled that of the woman he had seen, lying down with the man at the edge of the dancing green, at the start of his every meditation.

  A deep-throated growling filled the room, though she had no throat with which to make the sound.

  No, no, no, I don’t want … how did you catch me? Who are you? What? What is it you want?

  Gard mastered himself. What is your name?

  A sparkle in the whirling lights suggested scornful laughter. You think I’ll tell you? Conjure away, little thing.

  No. Listen to me! You lay with an Earthborn man once.

  Oooooohhhh, pleasure … no, I didn’t. Wait, yes, I did. Pretty man. All alone where they danced. I saw what he wanted and I became her, ha ha, I made myself flesh out of the apple blossoms, wasn’t I clever?

  Yes, yes, you were clever.

  And the lilies and the little, white, starry ones and the soft flesh of a doe carrying young and melons and the dew on the grasses. All sorts of things. I made a very nice body. We had delight. We had it for hours. I left him sleeping.

  Who was he?

  Who?

  The man!

  Some man, I don’t know. An Earthborn.

  You had a child by him.

  What? No, of course I didn’t. Oh! Wait. There was young. It kicked a lot. I was glad when it dropped.

  I was that child.

  You? No, silly, that was a baby. You’re a man.

  Time has passed. I grew. I am your son.

  Son? … What’s this wine for? Can I have some?

  Gard looked at her, despairing. He tried again: You are my mother.

  Mother? … What nice-looking wine.

  Did you give me a name, Mother?

  I don’t remember. Maybe if I had some wine, I’d remember.

  Gard sat back, exhaled. Take the wine. But don’t remember.

  The wine in the offering bowl smoked, it bubbled and hissed away into scented steam. Gard had been going to ask her to give him a name, if she had not done so in the hour of his birth; but he saw now what folly this would be.

  When the wine was gone, the demoness seemed to sigh; she took more of a woman’s shape, of beautiful hues like a meadow in spring.

  Ahhh. I liked that. So you are the child I bore?

  I am.

  All grown-up now. You’re handsome.

  Thank you.

  Well, what do you want?

  Nothing, now.

  I can kill someone for you, if you like. Fetch you something.

  Thank you. Perhaps another time.

  You are one of us. How are you able to do this? With the trapping circle?

  I was born in flesh. I walk in both worlds.

  How interesting. Well. Can I go now?

  Yes.

  Gard released her from his will, and she soared away, like a bird from his hand, like a fish into the river’s current.

  When he told Balnshik about it later, she patted his shoulder in sympathy, but shrugged. “I think she must be rather young,” she said, tactful as ever.

  9th day 4th week 5th month in the 250th year from the Ascent of the Mountain. This day, Slave 4372301 granted right of person. Assigned the name Gard, of the house of Magister Porlilon through affiliation. Registered as Adept, Magister-in-Training.

  Gard stood again before the council of mages, but this time there was no business with colored lights or darkness; only full colorless light on a council of greedy-looking old men and women, gazing at him intently. He wore the red loincloth now. As he stood before them, Grattur came, bearing a red robe, and draped it across his shoulders.

  “You have proven yourself able, Gard of Porlilon’s house,” said Magister Paglatha. “Worthy of your liberty, worthy of the great house that has lifted you from the dust. And, perhaps, worthy of our noble company. There remains but one test.”

  The Narcissus of the Void nodded. Engrattur stepped forth, looking rather nervous. He knelt before Gard, presenting him with a great book. It was blackened, as though it had been scorched, plain and battered-lookin
g; no jewels set here, nor any letters of gold. But when Gard took it in his hands, he felt the power crackling and humming through it.

  “This is the workbook of Most Exalted Magister Porlilon,” said Magister Paglatha. “Study it well. Within you will find the notes for his last great composition, which is the spell that would have released us all from our captivity within this mountain, had he lived to perform it. Many great mages have attempted it; none have succeeded. If you are able to succeed where so many have failed, then you will indeed be worthy, not only of a seat on this council, but the seat, and you shall rule us all. Do you dare attempt this, Gard of Porlilon’s house?”

  Gard looked up at them, with the same quiet stare with which he had faced his opponents in the arena. His eyes were blank. One or two of them smiled in their sleeves, to think what a simple great beast he was, for all his power.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “I think perhaps I should like to marry you, Gard,” said Lady Pirihine, lounging back on his bed. Grattur and Engrattur, standing to attention to either side of her, exchanged uneasy glances.

  “I am unworthy of such honor, lady,” said Gard, not looking up from his work.

  “Not before, but certainly now, don’t you think? We ought at least to have a child together.”

  Gard remembered the imbecile children penned for sacrifice. “I do not think that is possible, lady.”

  “You never know. You’re so splendidly vigorous, I’m sure I’d have a great lusty son. You’ve been practically adopted, as it is; we might make another Porlilon the Great. He’d grow up a prince, you know, because you’ll rule the council after you work the Great Spell.”

  “What does Lord Vergoin think of this, lady?”

  Lady Pirihine tossed her head. “He loves me like a brother and has always wanted what was best for me. And he has always wished you well. He’d be happy for us.”

  “Unfortunately, lady, the Great Spell requires that its practitioner remain celibate beforehand,” Gard lied.

  “It does?” Lady Pirihine sat up. “For how long?”

  “As long as possible. The greater the period of abstinence, the stronger the chances of success,” said Gard solemnly.

  “Oh.” Lady Pirihine looked at him, seemingly with genuine regret. “Then I really ought to leave you to your studies, oughtn’t I?”

  “It would aid my concentration, lady.”

  “And you must be able to concentrate, after all.” The Narcissus of the Void rose from his bed with a sigh. “Slaves, attend me in my private chamber.”

  Grattur and Engrattur grinned at each other, as they followed her out.

  Whatever his descendants might be, Porlilon had been a great mage. His book was wound through with spells that rose above the open pages like fretwork of red and golden light, invisible to anyone else, but Gard saw them clearly; the more so when he went out of himself, to regard them with a demon’s eye. Then the mage’s whole intent stood forth in solid detail, a living design, magnificent.

  Porlilon had written commentary in the margins, detailed notes on each spell, as though talking to himself, and all in a code that took Gard weeks to decipher. Gard worked through the simpler spells first, learning what thaumic energy was required to shatter a wall with a wave of his hand, or to deflect the flight of arrows.

  He formed a grudging respect for the dead mage; for though he himself found the mechanism of the magic transparently obvious, no such insight had been granted to Porlilon. The old man had done every step of his spells blind, by calculation, with an exactitude that approached art. Gard discovered rows of figures in the margins too, carefully worked out to the last tiny fraction of energy expenditure.

  In a late hour, though all hours looked the same under the mountain, Gard peered down at the last page of the Great Spell. He scowled; he rose from his chair to fetch a pair of candlesticks and set them by the guttering lamp beside which he had been reading, and ignited both with a gesture. By fresh white light he reread the last column of Magister Porlilon’s figures.

  “But that’s wrong,” he murmured to himself. He took paper and ink, and dipped his pen and copied the figures at the top of the column. He worked the sum through on his own, expecting any moment to find the decimal-point error that would make sense of what he had just read. Yet the result was unchanged. There was no error in the figures. The mistake must be greater, more fundamental, a flaw in the spell’s very conception.

  So accustomed had Gard grown to the precision and perfection of the old mage’s work, he felt now the sort of dismay he might feel watching a dignified elder roll, drunk as a demon, in the dust.

  The Great Spell could not possibly have worked. The energy it would require would be greater by a factor of ten than the amount stated in the opening conjecture.

  Gard rose and paced, attempting to control his panic. Had Porlilon been a fraud? Or had his Great Spell been incomplete, at his murder?

  He went to the book once more. No, the spell had been completed; for here underneath its last line was the mage’s glyph, as he drew it under each completed spell, a bird of prey gripping a rose of five leaves in either foot. But the right-hand rose was oddly truncated…. The truth struck home. Gard snapped his pen in two pieces. He concentrated, went out of himself, and saw the second spell laid over the page, the cloud that obscured the rose and what was written in the margin beside it and below. It had not been placed there by Magister Porlilon. Sweeping it back was as arduous as moving coiled chain, but it gave way to Gard’s will, and he read thereunder what had been concealed from him.

  Who among us would be willing? Anyone so great a fool as to miss the obvious would, alas, be incapable of the skill required to perform it. And they are selfish and fearful.

  Perhaps our best hope is in the distillation of our blood through intermarriage. It may be that a few generations may produce some prodigy capable of working this with success. If the child is detected early and persuaded, from his earliest years, how glorious and necessary his self-sacrifice and death would be … indeed, persuaded that any other destiny were unthinkable for such a hero … perhaps promised a paradisal afterlife?

  But it must be done in the very first bloom of his power, before said child is wise enough to sense the deception.

  The room was, suddenly, much brighter. Gard looked up and saw that the force of his wrath had made the candle flames huge, so the wax was nearly all consumed. The fire was roaring high in the hearth, green and silver. He watched as, one by one, his lamp and then every drinking vessel in the room shattered.

  His white anger subsided, froze into ice adamantine. Calmly he rose, fetched fresh candles, and lit them. He swept up the broken glass. Only then did Gard seat himself again, and turn the pages back to look once more at the opening prescription. Yes; here was the second spell, subtly altering the original figures for thaumic expenditure. Gard sat a while in thought, his black brows knitted. At last he found another pen. He opened his own workbook and placed it beside the one he had been studying all this while. He began to write.

  Now and again he referred to the old book, copying out whole passages with exact faithfulness. Now and again he copied other passages and made significant alterations in them.

  Duke Silverpoint was extinguishing the lamps in the Training Hall when Gard entered. He turned, surveyed Gard, and raised his eyebrows.

  “How might an old slave serve the redoubtable Gard, of the house of Magister Porlilon?”

  Gard scowled in embarrassment. He held up the bottle of wine he had brought. “This is a vintage from the lands of your people. I would like to drink it with you.”

  “Would you?” Silverpoint took the bottle and looked at it. “Ah. Rare vintage, indeed. It’s from the islands; some of them are nothing but stepped terraces of vineyards. At harvesttime the boats are decked with vine leaves, the black grapes are piled to the oarlocks, and the rowers sing as they ply the waters to and fro.

  “You don’t mean to get drunk, I hope. Those of your race
lose all discretion, when they become drunk.”

  “I will not get drunk,” said Gard, following the duke into his chambers.

  Silverpoint nodded. He took down matched goblets, opened the wine, and poured. He offered one to Gard, with a slight ceremonial bow. They sat to either side of Silverpoint’s hearth, speaking awhile of trivial things, and then:

  “Did I ever tell you how much I enjoyed The Fighting Mind?” said Gard.

  “You did not. I am gratified. It seemed to me that you, of all people, might make use of it.”

  “It is a shame the prince did not live to complete it.”

  “He had not written it out in full, at the time of his death, but he had indeed completed it. I sat with him, as I am sitting with you now, over a bottle of this same wine. He laid out for me the final chapter. We talked until nightfall, but I left him early, for my father disliked my late rising and would lock the house gate after the seventh hour.

  “The next morning the prince went out on some matter of business and was set upon by retainers of House Beatbrass—they were old enemies, the Firebows and the Beatbrasses, you know. Four against one, and he took his death wound, but he slew them first.

  “I can still recite his last chapter, so well I remember that night.”

  “Perhaps,” said Gard, “in that case, you would explain something to me.”

  “And what would that be?”

  Gard set his wine aside. “I noticed that the prince referred to a discipline he called the Second Mind. He implied that it could disguise a man’s intention even from himself, misleading anyone who might see into his thoughts. It sounded as though it would have been explained in the last chapter.”