The Sorcerer's Tome

by Philip Sealey

  “So what happens if you don’t find the sapling of that tree?” Tom asked.

  “I have to keep going until I do, even if I have to walk for days.”

  “Wow,” Tom said.

  “That is why in the past, humans, in regions heavily populated with vampires, always kept rice in their pockets,” Val continued. “If a vampire were chasing them, they would drop a pile of rice on the ground, and the vampire would not be able to move on until it had counted every single grain. It bought the poor human time to escape.”

  “Why did they have to do that?” asked Tom, intrigued.

  “Because any grain of rice which remained uncounted would crack open and release the souls of the creatures killed by the vampire and torment him constantly throughout eternity.”

  “But you know that can’t happen, right?” said Tom.

  “Right,” said Val. “But we are compelled to perform these rituals, even if it puts us in danger. Take my uncle Petrov. A nicer vampire, you could not wish to meet. He was walking home one night from the tavern when he noticed the wind had blown a haystack all across the path. He was compelled to collect every last stalk and place it back on the haystack so that in their loneliness, they did not steal people’s eyes in order to find their way back to the stack. He had almost finished when a glint caught his eye. It was something metal that shone in the rising sun. Realising that he had been there all night, he turned in horror as the sun rose out of the shimmering horizon and poof... He shrivelled into a man-shaped raisin. When they found him that little piece of shiny metal was still clutched in his withered hand. To this day he remains the only person ever to have actually found a needle in a haystack.”

  “Bummer,” said Tom. “It’s not all good fun being immortal is it?”

  “It is nature’s way of keeping the population down, I expect,” Val said philosophically. “There are very few creatures that prey on vampires, so we fall victim to our own neurosis.”

  While Val had been explaining the predicament of his race, he had unwittingly forgotten to count his steps. It suddenly came back to him, and he swore.

  “I’ve lost count,” he said, clearly perturbed. “I’ll have to go back.”

  “Val we need you with us when we get to the drawbridge,” Garren complained.

  “I know,” said Valcris, already hurrying off the way they had come. “I’ll catch you up, don’t worry.”

  Valcris disappeared behind a clump of protruding bushes as he hurried back to the dead tree. The remainder of the group carried on along the river bank. Tom felt that it was his fault Val had left them, for distracting him with questions. He walked on in silence, lost in thought for a while before noticing he was walking next to Maya.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” she said quietly. “You didn’t know about vampires.”

  “I don’t know about much in this place,” he said. “That’s why I need to get home.”

  “What’s your world like?” she asked.

  “Very different from here,” he answered. “There aren’t any vampires or werewolves or witches or fairies or anything except normal people. The only magic there is fake, done by conjurers with mirrors and stuff. We use technology to get things done, machines and computers and get around in cars or on buses.”

  “Cars,” Maya queried. “Are they metal carts that roar and pull themselves, without horses?”

  “Yep, that’s it.”

  “In this world, those cars and machines would be considered as strange and frightening as magic seems to you,” she said, feeling even more uneasy that her vision had in some way been confirmed by Tom’s description of the metal vehicles.

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Tom said sadly.

  “You will get home, Tom,” she assured him. “I can feel it.”

  Tom felt strangely cheered by this as if he knew Maya was right. He smiled at her looking again at those sky blue eyes. Her cheeks reddened as she smiled back at him, but despite her smile, her eyes betrayed the deep sadness that lay beneath.

  “There’s something up ahead,” called Dan, flying down to meet them.

  “What is it?” asked Garren, stopping.

  “It’s a little house, someone’s living there,” Dan said, changing form.

  Keeping to the cover of the undergrowth they crept on trying to remain as quiet as possible. As Dan had described, there was a little house, or to be more precise, a small wooden shack set back on the very edge of the wood. There was smoke rising from the metal chimney that protruded through the felted pitched roof. A closed door and a shuttered window adorned the front. The clearing between the dwelling and the river was scattered with wooden benches, fishing nets, tin pots which had at some time contained a black bitumen like substance, presumably for repairing the roof, or maybe the boat which was tied at the rickety jetty.

  “This is not good,” said Garren as he surveyed the scene. “It will add over an hour to our journey if we go back and find another route, maybe longer as it will be dark by then.”

  “Perhaps we could wait till dark and sneak past without anyone noticing,” suggested Tom.

  “It’s still quite a risk,” Garren said. “But it looks like we have little choice.”

  “I wonder who lives here,” said Lyca.

  “I have never heard of anyone living here, they certainly were not here when I was at the monastery,” Garren answered. “I wonder where their allegiance lies.”

  “Well, strictly speaking, I’m a public servant,” said a strange voice behind them, making everyone jump with surprise.

  The voice belonged to a very small, gaunt and very old man. His crooked little body was bent with age, and he was clothed in a very worn and shabby reddish-brown cloak, and high leather boots. He stood alongside them peering into the clearing, as they were doing, holding a bundle of firewood that he had just collected from the woods.

  “Who are you?” Garren spluttered.

  “I’m the Ferryman,” said the strange little man.

  “The Ferryman,” Garren replied. “I’ve never heard of a ferry here.”

  “Well, you are not very well informed, are you young cleric?” said the man shuffling off with his wood.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I told you, I’m the Ferryman. I run the ferry across the river.”

  “We tried to get across the river and were nearly killed,” Tom said.

  “You were damn lucky to survive that,” said the man, surprised. “The river spirit must have been in a good mood.”

  “How do you get across without that water thing attacking you?” Tom asked.

  “You don’t listen you young uns, do you?” The old man dropped the firewood onto a pile beside his shack and brushed the dirt off his hands. “I’m the Ferryman, that is why I’m here. If just anyone could row across the river, willy-nilly, whenever the mood takes ’em, I would be out of a job wouldn’t I?”

  It dawned on Garren that the original plan had once again become a possibility. “Would you row us across the river?”

  “Of course. That’s my job. I’m the Ferr...”

  “Ferryman,” finished Garren. “I know.”

  “I’ll take you in the morning as long as you can pay.”

  “We would be very grateful if you would row us across this evening. It is most important that we get to the other side as soon as possible,” Garren went on.

  “What!” exclaimed the old man. “Tonight! That means I’ll have to camp over there. It’ll cost you extra.”

  “How much?” asked Garren.

  “It normally costs one Obol per person, but as it’s out of hours, I’ll do it for one and a half.”

  “We only have groats, will that suffice?” Garren asked.

  “That’ll do, as long as they ain’t got spit all over ’em. They used to you know, all the time. Coming up to me and taking the coins out of their mouths. Mucky beggars.”

  “No spit,” Garren said, humouring him. “My honour.”

  “
That’ll be seven n’arf groats then,” the Ferryman said, holding out his arthritic hand.

  The cleric fished around in his cloak for his purse and began to count out the fare, when, hearing the sound of someone running, he turned, staff at the ready to defend them. He dropped it to his side again as with relief he recognised the form of Valcris hurrying to catch them up.

  “Hey Val, we’re going to cross the river again,” Lyca called.

  “Ooo,” said the Ferryman, rubbing his hands together. “Another. That’s nine groats now.”

  “No, it’s still only seven and a half,” said Dan. “I can fly across.”

  “Damn it,” said the Ferryman. “You sure, you look a bit big around the belly to start jumping off riverbanks.”

  “You worry about your boat and never mind me,” Dan said, annoyed, trying to ignore the sniggers of Lyca and Tom.

  Lyca filled the vampire in on recent events while Garren sorted out the finances. The Ferryman then went inside his little shack to pack for a night’s camping. After a few minutes, a great plume of steam billowed up from the chimney. The cloud of steam was still hanging in the still evening air when the Ferryman came out again with a canvas sack over his shoulder. He led the way to the boat.

  “Did you find your tree?” Tom asked Valcris as they clambered into the rickety old boat.

  “Yes,” replied Val.

  “Was it much further on?”

  “About twelve paces from where I lost count,” said the vampire grumpily taking his seat.

  Tom left it there.

  This boat was bigger than the rowing boat they had used earlier. Instead of oars, it was propelled across the water by a long pole that the old man used to punt across. Once everyone had sat down, he slipped the looped rope off the jetty post and pushed off with the pole.

  “How long have you been doing this?” Lyca asked.

  “Centuries,” replied the Ferryman. “But only about three years on this river, ever since that beggar at the monastery invoked the water spirit. They didn’t think it quite fair that he should take liberties with rights of way, so they put me here to even the odds a bit.”

  “Who put you here?” asked Garren.

  “Them what make the rules. Mot and the rest.”

  “Colin Mot put you here?” Garren said, shocked.

  “He was on the interview panel,” the old man answered.

  “Who else?”

  “Better you don’t know,” said the Ferryman, tapping the side of his nose with his finger and almost dropping his pole in the process.

  “If you were put here against Balfour’s wishes, how come he hasn’t tried to get rid of you?” Lyca enquired.

  “He’s tried several times, but gave up when he started running out of lackeys. Now he makes a big show of ‘allowing me to stay,’ providing I give him details of who I take across.”

  At this last statement, the travellers looked at each other in alarm.

  “And will you tell him about us?” Garren asked.

  “I doubt it,” replied the little man. “Not unless you irritate me even more than that jumped up, power-hungry little git does.”

  The tension eased.

  “What did you do before this?” Lyca asked.

  “Think I fished,” said the old man thoughtfully. “Can’t remember, to tell the truth, it was so long ago, back when the world was still young, I think. Then one day Mot came to me. Thought me days were numbered seein’ ’im appear on the riverbank, I can tell you. But instead, he offered me employment. ‘Job security,’ he said. Wanted me to run a ferry across the River Styx and take the souls of the dear departed to the land of the dead. ‘Endless supply of customers,’ he said. ‘Make you immortal,’ he said.

  “Didn’t look too far ahead though, did he? As new worlds were born and populations increased, more and more folk dropped off the twig, as it were. Well, look at the size o’ this boat. I couldn’t keep up with demand. There grew such a crowd on the south bank waiting to be ferried across.

  “I asked ’em for a bigger boat, a proper ferry what could take an ’undred or more at a time. I’d steer it from a nice cosy wheelhouse, out of the wind and the rain and wear a proper captain’s hat with an anchor on it an’ everything. Right grand it would have been.

  “But no! Wouldn’t have it, would they? Came out me shack one morning and there weren’t any passengers waiting to cross. You could have knocked me over with a sledgehammer. Went to bed and there were thousands o’ the beggars outside, all lined up, mouths full of money, moaning about queues and bad service an’ all that. Next morning, all gone.

  “Built a bloomin’ bridge, ’adn’t they. All my passengers gobbin’ their coins into a net at the toll booth and trampin’ merrily over the bridge, two by two.

  “Lucky! That’s wot Mot said. ‘You can retire,’ he said. ‘See the worlds,’ he said. ‘Buy a nice little cottage by the sea, settle down and enjoy eternity,’ he said. I ask you. Me!

  “Well it was alright, I s’pose, for the first two or three millennia, but then I got bored. I wanted my old job back. I’m a people person. But he said the bridge was doing just fine and would not take too kindly to being put out of business. ‘It’s not like a bridge that size can buy a cottage by the sea,’ he said. So him and the others,” he tapped his nose again, “had a conflab and they decided to stick me here. Didn’t even get a new boat. ‘Cutbacks,’ they said.

  “Now, I lives here. Punts a few people across the river once or twice a week and sees what I can do to annoy that twit in the monastery whenever I ca....”

  There was a heavy blow to the side of the boat.

  “Here we go again,” said Lyca falling to the deck and holding on.

  Maya flung her arms around Tom, shaking. He hooked his arm under the bench seat and put his other round Maya’s waist.

  “Oi!” the Ferryman shouted. “Pack that in.”

  Once again, the plume of water shot into the air and the swirl of droplets formed the female face which had threatened them earlier.

  “Sorry Charon,” I didn’t know it was you,” the water spirit said. “You’re out late this evening.”

  “In a bit of a hurry this lot,” replied the Ferryman.

  “Oh, it’s them again,” the watery face said. “They attempted to cross on their own earlier.”

  “Yeah, they did mention it, silly beggars.”

  “Will you be coming back this way tonight?”

  “No, I’ll be a campin’ over the other side tonight, Betty,” he said.

  “I’ll bid you good evening then,” said the spirit and returned to the river in a spray that covered everyone in the boat. It stopped rocking as the water became calm once more.

  “Did she call you Karen?” asked Tom.

  “Charon,” corrected the little man. “Kair-on, It’s a very distinguished ancient name, if you must know.”

  “Oh. Right,” said Tom and realising that he and Maya still had their arms around each other, separated quickly.

  The Ferryman carried on punting across the softly flowing river, muttering to himself as he pushed on the long pole and a short while later the companions stood, at last, on the far bank. The boat was tied up, and the Ferryman busied himself erecting a shabby grey tent.

  Valcris finally removed his long cloak and hood as the last glow of daylight sank below the canopy of the forest. “Are we to continue to the tunnels tonight?” he asked.

  “It’s too dangerous to travel through the forest at night,” Garren answered. “We could stumble across Sen-Trees. We should wait till first light before we continue. We’ll make camp here, with the Ferryman.”

  The cleric informed the others of his decision, and after Charon had warned them not to snore, Garren cleared the area of snow, then reached into his duffel and produced what looked like a toy camping set. There was a little tent with tiny hammocks suspended between posts and half a dozen small wooden chairs. He arranged them on the ground, well back from the fire being built by Dan and
raised his staff. Instantly the tiny display grew in size till it could comfortably accommodate the six travellers and their belongings.

  “Show off!” grumbled Charon.

  “I’ll go and get some more firewood,” Dan said. “It’s going to be cold tonight we’ll need a good fire.” He disappeared into the woods holding an oil lamp in front of him, while the others set about preparing a meal.

  Tom took all the backpacks into the tent and found Maya seated on the groundsheet in the corner. She didn’t hear him come in; her eyes were wide open but glazed and unseeing.

  “Maya, you OK?” he asked.

  She was startled and a little disoriented.

  “Yes,” she said after a moment. “I’m fine. I was thinking about my mother. I miss her.”

  “Yeah,” said Tom looking at the floor, “I miss my family too.” He held out his hand to help her up. “Come on, Garren has got some of that spiced wine on the go, let’s go have some.”

  They went and joined the others by the warm fire. Dan had already returned with one load of firewood and gone off again to collect more. As he said, now the winter sun had gone, it would be a cold night.

  Chapter 11

  Howl at the Moonglow

  Balfour was standing on the balcony of his private apartments in the west tower of the monastery. He gazed out into the darkness of the night, his hands spread on the balustrade. The sky was clear and the merest slither of the waning moon was visible as it helped the stars bathe the snow-covered land in an eerie light that sparkled on the crisp snow and shimmered in the gently flowing river. Above, the arched tunnel from where the river flowed an immense portcullis secured the entrance to the castle.

  When the brotherhood was there, the gate was always open to welcome weary travellers, but now it was only opened to allow the gord soldiers and guardians passage, then immediately closed again afterwards. On the other side of the portcullis was a large pontoon with two drawbridges opening to each side of the river, also only lowered for access.

  These, along with the high, six-foot thick walls, made invasion from the front impossible, and where the monastery was built into, or to be more accurate, carved out of the mountain, attack from the side and rear was equally unfeasible.