At least Cobweb and Romy joined me, Scruff thought, watching the girls hide behind the tree, waiting for the poodle. Romy's hair blazed orange in the darkness, and Cobweb's glowed with white light. Scruff found himself thinking that the spiderling, with her purple skin and sapphire eyes, was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. He felt his cheeks flush.
If I were a knight, maybe she'd like me, he thought, feeling big and clumsy and stupid. But I failed at being a knight. Hiding behind trees, waiting to scare a poodle.... Is that really my life now? Scruff couldn't remember ever being this depressed, even when first arriving on Hermit Island. He had hoped to be a knight by now, slaying dragons and saving maidens. Scaring poodles was somewhat less glamorous. But we do need those turnips. His stomach rumbled.
"Shh!" Romy whispered. "We can't hide if your tummy keeps growling."
"Okay, okay," Scruff whispered. Norman clutched in his hands, he addressed the girls. "You know the drill. When the poodle shows up, we leap out, waving weapons and screaming."
"And then we catch the poodle and eat it!" Romy said with joy.
Scruff shook his head. "No, Romy, we've gone over this a million times. No eating poodles."
Romy pouted. "But we love poodles in the underground! We eat poodle noodle soup. Pnoodle soup."
"You're making that up," Scruff said, wanting be anywhere else in the world.
Romy shook her head, hair of flame crackling. "Nu uh. It's all true."
"How could you possibly have poodles underground?" he demanded, feeling his face flush.
Romy shrugged. "How could you possibly have poodles over ground?"
"All right, all right, just be quiet," Scruff said, clutching Norman. "I think I hear the poodle."
He peeked from behind the tree. True enough, the fluffy dog came wandering into the yard. She was a tiny dog, no larger than a cat, covered with curly white fur, sporting a pink ribbon on her head.
"Now!" Scruff shouted and leaped out, brandishing his mace, howling. The girls leaped out with him, screaming, waving their arms and jumping up and down. Romy especially looked fearsome, her fangs glinting, her bat wings flapping.
The poodle stared in shock... then fell over and lay still.
Scruff lowered his mace. Oops.
"Oh no!" Cobweb said, eyes widening. She ran forward, knelt by the poodle, then looked up with teary eyes. "She's d-dead. Heawt attack." She covered her eyes, sobbing.
"Yum yum, turnips and pnoodle soup tonight!" Romy said, rubbing her belly. "Mmm mmm."
Cobweb tried to revive the poodle, but to no avail. The spiderling lowered her head, her gossamer hair covering her face. The sight of her crying tore Scruff's heart. Awkwardly, he put a hand on her shoulder, trying to comfort her.
"She's in a better place now," he said, patting the spiderling's shoulder.
Cobweb raised her teary eyes. "Weawwy?" she asked.
Romy interjected. "She sure is." The demon was stuffing the poodle into a pot.
"Romy!" Scruff growled, snatched the poodle, and gave the demon a withering look. Romy stuck her tongue out at him and turned away, arms crossed.
A door creaked, and the elderly peasant emerged from his house, beaming. "Good job, good job," he said and danced a jig. "Here, have two sacks of turnips."
"Do you have any noodles?" Romy asked him.
"You're not eating the poodle!" Scruff howled. He stared at the dead dog in his arms, forlorn. I can't believe what we've sunk to, he thought and heaved the longest, deepest sigh of his life.
The next morning, the Bullies left the village, carrying two sacks of turnips.
Chapter Seven
Snow and Fire
Jan Rasmussen had been away from Burrfield for six years, and he was scared to return.
As he walked the path through Teasel Forest, boots rustling snow, he thought of Amabel's beauty—her gray eyes, dark blond hair, impish nose. The most beautiful girl I've seen, Jan thought. She had been fourteen when he left Burrfield, and he sixteen.
"Wait for me," he had said and kissed her, but six years had passed. She was probably married by now, raising a family, but still Jan dared to hope. For six years he studied, finally becoming a warlock last week, and for these six years he dreamed.
"Maybe she'll run toward me," he told his pet snake, "kiss me, tell me she waited every day on the outskirts of town."
The familiar—a baby viper named Baumgartner—sat on Jan's shoulder. He hissed as if agreeing. Sometimes it seemed like the snake understood everything Jan said.
During the past six years, studying in the pits of the Coven, he thought about Amabel every day. During the lonely nights, sleeping in mossy caverns between his grimoires, he pretended that she lay beside him. In his mind she never changed, never aged. What would she look like today, six years later?
What about me? Have I changed? Jan examined his reflection in icicles upon birch branches. His hair still boasted the shagginess of youth, and his cheeks were pink from the cold. When he had left Burrfield, he was a dour youth with messy hair and jutting bones. He was wider now, his features harder, but his eyes had remained unchanged—the same strange eyes, midnight black flecked with gold like stars.
"She'll recognize me at once," he said to Baumgartner, crossing a bridge over a frozen stream. The birches shivered at his sides, heavy with snow.
Of course, for a warlock, he was still a kid. At twenty-two, he was the youngest warlock in the world, possibly the youngest in history. The others were stern graybeards with bushy eyebrows, backs bent and eyes squinty from decades of leaning over spellbooks in candlelight. Many had not left the Coven in decades, even centuries, spending their lives underground. Jan did not want to end up like them. Six years in the Coven—weaving black magic underground, never seeing daylight—had placed loneliness and hunger within him. He made no friends in the Coven. The other apprentices feared his powers, and even the old warlocks grumbled about his shifty eyes and frequent snarl. Jan did not care. He had not joined the Coven to find a home, like some of the apprentices who were outcasts in the outside world.
Jan had joined the Coven because he knew he had a gift. He knew—since he was born—that he was made to weave black magic. It was in his bones.
Baumgartner hissed, severing Jan's thoughts.
"What is it, friend?" Jan asked, patting his familiar.
The snake released a strange, high-pitched mewl. Jan's hackles rose; he hadn't known snakes could make such sounds. Most warlocks chose bats, hawks, owls, or other flying beasts to be their familiars, but Jan had chosen a snake. While the other warlocks could spy from above, Jan's familiar would creep below, more dangerous than any winged creature.
"What's wrong?" he asked again. Baumgartner was coiling and hissing.
With snapping twigs and stomping boots, the answer revealed itself.
Ten men emerged from the forest, five behind Jan, five before him, trapping him on the road. They held clubs studded with nails, pointed sticks, and chipped daggers. Unshaven and dirty, they wore random patches of fur and dented armor.
Outlaws, Jan knew, and hungry ones by the looks of it.
"Hello there!" Jan said, amusement tickling him. The road to Burrfield had been long and somber, but this encounter promised some entertainment.
"Good day," said one of the outlaws, stepping forward. He seemed to be their leader, and Jan guessed that he was of noble birth. He was taller and broader than his friends, hinting at a past affluent enough to provide steak dinners, and when he smiled, he revealed no missing teeth, which was more than could be said for the others. His sword was rusty and chipped, and his breastplate dented, but both were made of costly steel; they had once been the weapons of a knight.
"These are hard times," Jan said, "if knights have sunk as low as to wander Teasel Forest with footpads."
The outlaw-knight nodded, his smile vanishing. "You have good eyes, friend, if you could spot my background; my name is Sir Corlin Morno of Queenpool. These are hard times, and they jus
t got harder for you. Empty your cloak's pockets, and we'll let you live."
The outlaws raised their weapons, greed and bloodlust filling their eyes. Jan's smile widened. This would be fun.
"Are you sure, dear Sir Morno?" he said. "The pockets of this cloak contain strange things... marvelous, wondrous things to be sure... but dangerous, friend. Are you sure you want to see them?"
One of the outlaws, a squat man with one eye and a studded club, growled. "I say we kill him."
Jan shrugged, one eyebrow raised. "That's certainly a possibility."
Sir Morno shook his head, eyes dark. "We are not murderers, only hungry men. Empty your pockets."
I like this! Jan thought. "Very well," he said and complied. Out of his pockets, he pulled a bat skull, a ball of cobwebs, and a pickled cow's eye.
"What the—" Sir Morno began when Jan tossed the items into the air.
With a quick spell, the items exploded above, raining ash and sparkling black magic.
"A warlock!" an outlaw cried, but it was too late. The black magic seized them, twisting them, knocking them down. They screamed and writhed as Jan watched with a smile. He uttered a few more words, and the outlaws shrunk, sprouted white fur, and twitched their whiskers.
Within a few moments, it was over.
The outlaws were mice.
Jan moved from one to another, stomping his boots. The mice could not flee; his magic held them in place. Squeak! Squeak! His boots kept stomping, making mice pancakes.
He raised his boot over the last mouse—Sir Morno, the outlaws' leader—then paused when he heard Baumgartner hiss.
"You're right, Baumgartner," Jan said and patted the snake. "You deserve a treat."
He lifted the mouse and held it up. Baumgartner slithered down Jan's arm, gulped down the mouse, and sighed contentedly.
"Yum yum," Jan said and patted the snake. You don't find fun like this in the Coven.
He kept walking. Soon he saw Burrfield ahead.
* * * * *
As he walked down Burrfield's streets, Jan saw that the town had barely changed. Iron lanterns still lined the cobbled roads, smelling of the oil that would light them at nights. Fort Rosethorn still frowned upon a hill in the south, crumbly and overrun with roses. The church still towered behind old pines, spires scratching the sky. Down the road, patrons were entering the Porcupine's Quills, the town's busiest tavern. There were a few more houses, and some of the side streets were now cobbled, but otherwise it was the same old Burrfield, the same old town where Jan had spent his first sixteen years.
Will Amabel be the same too?
Jan walked toward the Porcupine's Quills, which Amabel's father owned. He knew he'd find her there. It was a large tavern, three stories of waddle-and-daub, green tiles covering its roof. Its stained-glass windows sparkled, and its five chimneys pumped smoke into the winter sky. The smell of ale, fresh bread, and beef stew wafted into the street, making Jan's stomach rumble.
He paused outside the tavern to steady himself. More than it ached with hunger, his stomach ached with nervousness, and his fingers trembled. This is stupid, he thought. I'm a warlock now, not an awkward youth; there's no reason to be nervous. And yet his stomach still whirled and his breath was shaky. For years at the Coven, Amabel had filled his dreams. All that time, he'd been waiting for this moment, the moment he'd return to see the only girl he'd ever loved.
She's twenty now, a voice in his mind whispered. She's probably married. She probably forgot you.
And yet he dared to hope, to dream she's run into his arms, that she'd be his wife.
Jan approached the tavern's doors, heavy cherry doors engraved with pomegranates. Once this place had been Jan's home away from home, the place where he spent his happiest hours—his only happy hours.
With a deep breath, Jan stepped inside.
Indoors, the Porcupine's Quills hadn't changed. Fires crackled in two towering fireplaces, lighting the room, casting out the winter cold. The firelight glinted against the stained-glass windows, which depicted scenes of frolicking spiderlings. The smell of beef, bread, and beer filled the room, making Jan's mouth water.
Old Jon Brewer—Amabel's father—stood upon a barrel, a crowd surrounding him. He was speaking to the crowd, a mug of ale in hand, his cheeks rosy.
"Thank you, my friends, for joining us here. The ceremony this morning was beautiful, just beautiful." The beefy man wiped a tear from his eye. "When the happy couple read their vows, I knew it was the happiest day of my life. Now let's drink and celebrate the marriage of Amabel, my beloved daughter!"
The crowd cheered.
Jan stared, mouth opening.
As men and women raised their mugs in blessing, Jan caught sight of his love. Amabel stood among the crowd, wearing an azure gown, her hair strewn with flowers. She held the arm of her new husband, a tall man with a handlebar mustache. The man looked familiar, but Jan did not spare him a second glance; he could think of nothing but his pain.
His heart felt like hellfire, crackling and flaming. He took quick breaths, feeling faint. Head spinning, he marched forward, pushing aside drinking patrons. He wanted to cry, and every breath ached in his lungs. Amabel—married? He had spent years away, and she got married this day of all days? His eyes stung. Had God cursed him? Was this punishment for weaving his dark spells?
Knees shaky, breathing heavily, Jan reached Amabel and stood before her. She looked at him with a smile. At first she did not recognize him, and Jan's head spun. He had dreamed of seeing her for so long, and she looked so much the same. The girl had become a woman, but still had those sparkling gray eyes, that impish nose, that curly hair. She's so beautiful, more than I remembered, a million times more. Jan's chest ached.
Slowly Amabel's smile vanished, and her eyes narrowed."Jan," she whispered, paling.
"Amabel," he said, love for her filling him, flowing through his bones like electricity. God, I love her, more than ever.
She still held her husband's arm, and finally Jan recognized him. The tall, mustached man was Sam Thistle, the son of a knight, probably himself now a knight. He and Jan were the same age, and would play chess as children. Jan had always been a loner, and Sam had been his only childhood friend.
"Amabel," Jan said, voice soft, lips barely moving. "I...."
He could say no more. He saw tears in her eyes. Tears filling his own eyes, Jan fled the tavern, shoving revelers aside.
He walked through the snowy streets, not knowing where he went, tears on his cheeks. Some townsfolk stared, while others pretended not to notice. Those who remembered him from years past knew of his love for Amabel, and they averted their eyes, nodding sadly. Let them see me cry, let them mock me. I don't care. I'm a warlock now. Nothing can hurt me anymore. Nothing.
Yet still his tears fell.
When he could take it no longer, he rushed into an alley, fell to his knees, and wept. Pathetic, he knew, but he could not curb his tears. Shame filled him. The mighty warlock, the youngest of his kind, sobbing in an alley like a child! He clenched his fists. No. No! If I want her, I'll have her. I always get what I want. Always. I won't let her go.
Wiping his eyes, he stood up, fire burning through him. The old anger flared, the anger that could always drive him, the anger that led him to become a warlock, the youngest warlock in the world, maybe the most powerful, too. I will have her. Sam Thistle will not stand in my way. When they had been children, Sam had been a worthy adversary in their chess games, but Jan always ended up defeating him. I will defeat you now too. You have placed me in check, old friend, but you have not yet won the game.
That night, Jan walked up Friar Hill, the grassy knoll in north Burrfield where wandering friars sometimes preached. There he spread ashes around him and lit a ring of fire. Clouds gathering over the stars above, Jan raised his hands, and the ring of fire crackled around him, burning black. Demon ghosts danced around him, eyes red, smiles drooling. Tears on his cheeks, rage burning through him like the fire, Jan Rasmussen reached
downward, deep into the hill, deep into the earth, down and down into the pits of Hell.
"Issa!" he shouted, his words shaking the world. "Answer my call."
Around him, Friar Hill disappeared, Burrfield disappeared, the entire world vanished. He could see only the caverns of the underworld, burning with columns of flame and rivers of lava, reverberating with the screams of sinners and the screeches of demons. He sent his power into the bowels of the Ninth Circle, the deepest and hottest level of Hell where demons whipped sinners and pain dwelt.
"Issa!" he cried. "Do you hear me?"
He had discovered the demon Issa three years ago. She was the most powerful demon he'd ever contacted, chief of the torturers of Hell. She oversaw a demon army of fire and malice, an army bred to torment the souls of sinners. Issa was cruel and mighty, a deadly combination.
She was also, Jan knew, madly in love with him.
He could use that now.
As in a feverish dream, he flew through the fire. Jan's spirit roamed the tunnels of Hell, passing over sinners on racks, flying over pools of lava where demons dunked screaming souls, and flew toward the greatest demon there, the cruelest entity of fire.
Issa.
She opened her eyes, irises woven of fire, and they were all Jan could see, two flames gazing into his soul.
"My love," she whispered and licked her lips.
Sam Thistle, spoke whispers around town, was a great knight, a warrior who fought in the Crusades, a deadly enemy. He could be tough to kill, even for a warlock, but Issa knew no bounds. No knight could harm her, not even Sam Thistle. She would do this for him.
"Issa," Jan said, voice traveling from miles away. "I need you to kill someone."
She blazed, unfurling her bat wings. "For you, anyone."
Someone grabbed his shoulder.
Jan screamed in pain.
His physical body, roused from the dream, yanked his soul back in, sucking it up like a noodle. Jan's spirit was pulled away from Issa, shooting up through the tunnels, up through the earth, flying back into his body with a thud. He opened his eyes, his spirit back on Friar Hill, once more inhabiting his physical form. He opened his eyes, enraged, pain filling him. Who had broken his trance, interrupted his spell?
Eye of the Wizard: A Fantasy Adventure Page 8