Defenders of Magic 01 - Night of the Eye

by Scorpion ZS 256

  Guerrand gave a wintry laugh. "More title than substance. Anyway," he said, anxious to change the subject, "when I was quite young, I found some books with interesting symbols. I read them over and over, and before I knew it, I'd performed my first cantrip—I made my little sister's hair glow as if it were on fire."

  "These books predated the Cataclysm, you say?" Lyim whistled. "Would I like to get my hands on some of those. I bet they contain some long-forgotten spells."

  Guerrand eyes widened. "I never thought of that. They just seemed old and dusty to me." He pulled up his pack to serve as a pillow. "It sounds like we couldn't have taken more different paths to the same place. We must both utter a prayer of thanks to Habbakuk or whatever luck allowed us to survive the trip through Wayreth, as well as being accepted by the highest mages in our order."

  Lyim's eyes turned dark in the firelight. "I don't believe in luck." His voice was brittle. "I've earned everything I've ever achieved. By myself. Despite the fates, you might say. And I've only just begun."

  Guerrand held up a hand. "I meant no offense, Lyim—"

  "I know what you meant," said Lyim, his jaw tightening. "I've seen the attitude all my life." He screwed up his face, as if imitating someone. "Rule number one: Without exception, nobles are better than common folk." He ticked the concept off on a finger. "Rule number two: A man of modest means has made nothing of himself— he's lazy and hasn't used his skills to advance his lot. But if that same man is successful, he was simply lucky."

  Guerrand fell silent. He could not dispute that what Lyim said was true. He had witnessed Lyim's rule number one. Why were Cormac and Rietta, by birthright, permitted to live in the luxury of the privileged class, while far more productive people, like Wilor the silversmith, were simply common workmen? Looking at Lyim's angry face, Guerrand realized that some men harbored greater burdens than a wicked sister-in-law's tongue.

  "Well," Lyim finished, angrily grinding a smoldering ash outside the fire circle under his boot, "I intend to be the luckiest man ever to live." With that, he stomped into a small ring of trees beyond the firelight.

  Lyim had been gone only a few minutes, when Guerrand heard a rustling noise in the trees. He looked up, expecting to see Lyim returning from the darkness in an improved mood. But there was no one, nothing. Guerrand shrugged off the sound, attributing it to a small animal.

  Moments later, he heard the sound again. It was definitely something moving through the underbrush, beyond the reach of the fire's light. Guerrand stood and kept the flames between himself and the noise. The light shone annoyingly in his eyes, and he could see no shapes or movement that did not belong in the woods.

  "Lyim, is that you?" he called, trying to appear brave, but succeeding only in turning paler than a mushroom. No reply came to reassure him.

  Then Guerrand heard the sound again, behind him this time. He spun around and saw his pack, which he had been using as a pillow just moments before, rising roughly through the air, its flap opening and the whole thing bulging and moving as though someone was rummaging inside. The sight made his jaw drop, but an instant later it clenched tight in anger. If a stupid little cantrip was Lyim's idea of a joke ... Everything of value that Guerrand owned was in that pack, including his spellbook and the magical mirror containing Zagarus. He scooped a large piece of flaming wood from the fire and stepped menacingly toward the strange scene.

  "Lyim, just stop right now," Guerrand called. "You're going way too far this time." But the invisible intruder paid no heed, continuing instead to rifle Guerrand's pack.

  Growing angrier by the second, the young mage prodded the stick toward where he suspected Lyim was standing. But the weak thrust was struck aside. The force of the blow surprised Guerrand. The torch had nearly been knocked from his hand. Guerrand knew the rules of this spell. If Lyim were invisible, the blow would have made him visible again.

  An icy chill ran up Guerrand's spine. "Who are you? What are you?" he bellowed. There was no response. Fear squeezed his heart. Where in the Abyss was Lyim, and why wasn't he coming out of the woods?

  With all his strength behind it, Guerrand swung the flaming log. It traveled through the air with a thick, whooshing sound before cracking into something solid. Sparks showered the area and Guerrand's pack tumbled to the ground. Still completely unsure what he was fighting, but reassured that it was physical, Guerrand swung the burning club again. This time his blow swished harmlessly through the air.

  Guerrand gasped suddenly, unable to breathe. The air spun around him, raising clouds of dirt. His body was being squeezed, as if the air itself were pressing in so tightly that it might crush him. The brand dropped to the ground and rolled away while the young mage kicked and struggled against the invisible foe.

  Just as suddenly, Guerrand was released. He collapsed to his hands and knees, gasping for breath. Scurrying away, he saw small whirlwinds of dust weaving toward him.

  "Lyim!" Guerrand yelled toward the thicket, and still there was no answer. Touching his fingers together tip-to-tip, Guerrand mumbled the words of a spell. The air about him shimmered, and then he rolled quickly to the left. As he moved, he appeared to split in half, leaving an exact image of himself in his wake. Then both Guerrands split again, creating four, and again, until there were eight Guerrands crouching around the fire. Each was identical to the original. Each one moved in exactly the same manner. There was no way for an observer to tell which, if any of them, was the real Guerrand and which were magical duplicates.

  The horde of small whirlwinds paused momentarily, unsure which enemy to attack. Then they chose one, apparently at random. Again the air smashed in, swirling and crushing, until the first counterfeit Guerrand disappeared without a sound, taking with it the whirlwinds of dust.

  Frantically, the seven remaining images scanned the area, trying to locate the invisible creature. When a stick snapped, all heads turned toward it, but not soon enough. A second image was crushed and destroyed before Guerrand could reach it.

  The six images would last until they were destroyed, but Guerrand knew that was only a matter of time. Eventually this thing would get lucky and attack the real Guerrand. He had a dagger to fight it with, but Guerrand doubted he could survive getting close to his assailant again.

  A third image was being pinned and squeezed. All five of the others turned toward the scene and pointed. Guerrand mentally prepared to cast another spell. Unable to actually see his foe, he was taking a big chance. Again he shouted the memorized words that triggered a magical release.

  "Sula vigis dolibix!" Two tiny, glowing arrows appeared next to each image's outstretched finger and streaked toward the assumed target. Simultaneously the arrows disappeared in a burst of light, and a sound, like air being forced through a long tube, reverberated around the campfire. A hit! Guerrand rejoiced that the creature could be hurt, though he had run out of ideas about how to attack it.

  A fourth image was crumbling when, to his utter relief, Guerrand noticed the robed figure of the other apprentice standing at the edge of the woods. "Lyim!" he cried.

  The other mage held up his hand for silence. He'd ripped a small square of cloth from the hem of his robe. Lyim tossed it onto the ground. There it flopped and writhed before a stream of rats burst forth and rushed toward where the fourth image of Guerrand had disappeared. The rats' tiny eyes glowed red in the firelight as they swarmed forward. Guerrand couldn't begin to count them; dozens rushed into the light, and still more poured out from the thrashing cloth, until there might have been hundreds charging ahead.

  The rats found the invisible creature as surely as Guerrand's magical missiles had. They ran into it, up it, around it, defining its outline. The creature was tall, not quite twice Guerrand's height, and vaguely human shaped. As the rats sank their teeth into its invisible flesh, if it was flesh, the creature's haunting wail filled the night, drowning out the raucous squeaking of the rodents. Rats were crushed and squeezed and pulped, flung into the fire or away into the shadows, but st
ill more streamed out, until the scene was a seething mound of biting rats. Guerrand stepped back, aghast. Aside from his simple magical missile spell, which was clean and brief, he had never seen violent magic turned loose against a living thing. The ground was thick with the crushed and lifeless bodies of rats, and still the mound thrashed and squirmed beneath them. Rat corpses hissed and sizzled in the fire, while maimed rats dragged their wounded bodies around in circles or attacked each other.

  Finally the heaving mound was still. As the invisible thing's struggles ceased, the heap collapsed, as if the enemy beneath had suddenly slipped away. Their foe destroyed, the surviving rats turned and streamed back toward the cloth square, disappearing beneath it and returning to whatever magical stuff they had been summoned from. The bodies of the dead rats crumbled into dust and then were gone. As the last rat disappeared, so did the bit of cloth.

  Lyim surveyed the scene with a look of incredible satisfaction on his face. "Now, which of you should I be addressing...? I bet you're, oh, that one right there. Am I right?"

  Guerrand realized he was still surrounded by several images of himself. "Wrong." With a mental command, the extra Guerrands disappeared. He plunked down by the fire and peered through his pack. Everything seemed to be there. Most importantly, the mirror that contained Zagarus was still safe beneath Guerrand's spare socks.

  "What was that thing, anyway?" he asked when Lyim strode over to join him.

  "I'm not exactly sure." Lyim examined the torn hem of his robe. "I felt bad about the way I stormed off, so I was on my way back when I heard you call out. By the time I got to the edge of the woods, it looked like an invisible bear or something was squeezing the life out of you. I couldn't figure out what was going on, so I hunkered down and watched for just a moment, trying to get some idea of how to help."

  Lyim snapped his fingers. "That image trick was a good idea, by the way. I'd say it saved your life while I was working up the rat spell."

  Guerrand shivered, remembering the feel of all the air being crushed from his lungs. "I'd say so, too." Both men sat quietly for several moments. Guerrand poked through the fire with a stick. "Thanks, Lyim."

  "It was nothing." The other apprentice clapped Guerrand on the back. "Let's just hope that whatever that thing was, it doesn't have any relatives in the area." With that, Lyim rolled out his blanket, curled into it, and was fast asleep in moments.

  Guerrand knew that sleep would not come to him tonight. He stared into the fire until the sun rose in the east.

  *****

  Walking along the coast of the bay, Guerrand and Lyim made it to the foothills late the next day. The weather was hot. Both mages kept their heavy, coarse robes rolled up in their packs. Though the landscape was barren, seemingly devoid of people, a mage could never be sure when he'd come upon someone who feared magic.

  "The coast here reminds me of where I grew up on Northern Ergoth," Guerrand remarked. "Few cliffs and dunes, mostly flatlands that roll right into the sea. The waters here are calmer, though, being a bay."

  "Northern Ergoth..." muttered Lyim. "Isn't that just a backwater, mostly inhabited by those awful little kender creatures?"

  Guerrand felt himself bristle. "They occupy a small portion of it in the eastern woodlands, yes. The western half is quite civilized. We even have an emperor. Mercadior Redic V is his name."

  "Really?"

  "Yes," said Guerrand. "Why, just last month, someone in my village discovered how to make fire."

  "All right, all right, I get it!" cried Lyim, laughing. "Sorry."

  Guerrand nodded. He wasn't sure why he'd felt so defensive of his homeland—he'd never felt much affinity for it before. Perhaps, he reasoned, it's because I already feel like such a rube compared to Lyim. It didn't sit well to be reminded that he came from a "backwater." The realization reinforced Guerrand's resolve to study hard and learn his master's lessons quickly.

  At noon on the second day, the northern foothills turned to mountains. It took the apprentice mages two and one half long, hot days to reach the crest of the second mountain. To their great surprise and relief, the mages looked down upon a wondrous, sprawling city. It was their first view of Palanthas, the city that would be their home, and their classroom, for years to come.

  Guerrand sucked in his breath at the view. Blindingly white against the blue, late-summer sky, the city of mages was laid out like a wheel. Like the spokes of that wheel, eight major thoroughfares radiated in perfectly straight, perfectly spaced lines from a central courtyard. Each road passed through the city wall beneath impressive gates flanked by twin minarets. The city had obviously been constructed over a long period of time, since the central portion within the city gates appeared older. Still, the architect of the newer section beyond the walls had gone to great extremes to match the old in both style and materials, some granite, though mainly extremely expensive and impressive polished white marble. Guerrand had not seen such marble except for the carved plinths at Stonecliff. Well-maintained homes of simpler design continued on into the surrounding hillsides.

  "Did Justarius give you any clue as to where to go?"

  Guerrand shook his head. "He gave me a riddle. He told me that getting to Palanthas and locating his home was a crucial, first step in my training. How about Belize?"

  Lyim frowned his frustration. "Not really. Just before he left the tower he said something like, 'If you make it to Palanthas—' "

  "He said 'if'?"

  "Maybe he said when, I don't know. Let me think." Lyim closed his eyes to concentrate. "What he said was, 'My house is in Palanthas. If you get that far, knock on the door and wait.'"

  "That's it?"

  Lyim snorted good-naturedly. "Hey, at least it's not a riddle. Let's hear your great clue."

  Guerrand, with an exaggerated, imperious lift of his eyebrows and a mischievous gleam in his eyes, stepped back and recited, " 'At morning's midlife, mark the hour, the eye is the sun, the keyhole's the tower.' "

  "Oh, really useful, that," guffawed Lyim. "I bet I can bribe someone into leading me to Belize's place before you figure out that one."

  With joyous shouts, the two mages donned their robes and broke into a run toward the city of mages and their futures. The rugged mountain road gave way to a beautiful tree-lined avenue. Straight as an arrow, it sloped sharply downward, headed directly through a gate topped by minarets. It appeared to end at a palatial estate in the center of the city Guerrand and Lyim stood at the gate of the outer wall, with a stunning view of the city laid out before them.

  "Home was never like this, eh?" Lyim declared.

  "It still isn't." Both apprentices looked at each other, wondering who had spoken.

  A tall, slim young woman stepped forward from behind a tree. She wore a sleeveless, shimmering gown of rose, gathered just beneath her breasts in the classic style. Curly tendrils of shiny golden-red hair ringed her face, its bulk caught up in a coil high on the back of her head. A thick silver arm bracelet in the shape of a snake encircled the flawlessly tanned flesh of her right bicep. Guerrand found himself thinking she was as perfectly beautiful as Lyim.

  "I am Esme. Justarius sent me to introduce one apprentice mage named Guerrand to Palanthas."

  "How did you know we were here?" asked Lyim.

  The young woman looked amused. "Magic." She glanced from one gaping man to the next, an exquisitely shaped brow arched in question. "Which of you would be Guerrand?"

  Both apprentices seemed to find their voices at the same time. "Me!" Looking at each other, they laughed.

  Esme, however, did not seem to find them amusing now. Maintaining a solemn expression, she asked, "Shall I be forced to guess? Justarius would be most displeased if I chose incorrectly. He despises tomfoolery."

  The smile dropped instantly from Guerrand's face. Pushing back his hood, his head hanging slightly, he stepped forward. "I am Guerrand. Please excuse us if we seem a bit giddy. We've traveled long and hard to get here."

  She seemed to consider that f
or a moment. "Who is he?" Esme's auburn head jerked toward the other mage.

  Lyim stepped up boldly, gave his name and a slight bow of his head. "I have come to apprentice with the Master of the Red Robes, Belize himself," he said proudly. To his surprise, Esme looked less than impressed. Guerrand detected a flash of pity, but the expression was gone in the blink of a long-lashed eye.

  "I see." Esme turned on a soft-booted heel and without another word set off down the smoothly paved avenue. Guerrand and Lyim glanced at each other again, then trotted after the rosy robe that seemed to float like a windswept cloud above the paving stones.

  Lyim jogged up to her left side. "I am most anxious to get acquainted with my new home and would appreciate the opportunity to tour it with a guide even more lovely than this most beautiful of cities."

  Esme looked at him out of the corner of one eye. "As you will." She waved an arm to the left. "We pass through the area known as Nobles' Hill." Striking, expensive white marble mansions were nestled into the hillside on the eastern edge of the city just beyond the city wall. Esme led them under the twin minarets. "This is still Nobles' Hill, but only the wealthier, higher-placed nobles live within the Old City."

  Knowing that, Guerrand could detect slight differences here; the architecture was even more elaborate, the landscaped lawns longer, columns more intricately carved.

  "Is this where Justarius lives, then?" he asked.

  Esme smiled. "Now, what use would a mage have for living among snobbish nobles?"

  Guerrand reddened. Lyim seized the opportunity. "I couldn't agree with you more. However, Guerrand here is a nobleman in his own lands and has a hard time understanding the plight of the toiling classes. I myself have tried to help him in that regard during our travels."

  Guerrand sucked in a breath.

  Esme, however, looked bemused. "Don't be ridiculous. It's an occupational consideration, not a class one. I, too, am considered to be of noble birth in my homeland."