Shadow Star

by Chris Claremont

  “I’m not sure. Demons.” She rose to her feet and started pacing, mixing in a flip-hop of a dance step at random intervals as she used her body to keep up with the furious pace of her thoughts. “They exist outside all the known laws. They consider themselves the embodiment of chaos. What was it someone called them? The bastard siblings of the dragons, without any sense of responsibility or care for the consequences of their actions. The dragons are the embodiment of morality, they stand at the pinnacle of order. Demons have none, and couldn’t care less.”

  The Professor nodded. “That’s why they’re objects of such desire for wizards with more ambition than is good for them. The goal of harnessing that unimaginable power is worth the equally unimaginable risk. Do you think the Deceiver is such a one?”

  Elora shrugged. “Would it matter? I’d still be left without the means to stop her.”

  “You could find a demon of your own and bind its power.”

  That prompted a laugh, but not of humor. “I’ll pass, thanks.” Even as she spoke, however, she heard a tempting whisper within her head: don’t speak so quickly, girl, considering a demon often walks within an arm’s length of you.

  And we’re bound, the two of us—the three of us, she amended, including Thorn in her thought—by ties far more lasting than any sorcerous ward. Those of friendship, she thought, and trust.

  Though the Professor practiced no magic—in that regard he was as bereft of ability as she—he was as familiar with the forms and structures of the art as any adept magus. Much of what was known about the Great Realms beyond the Veil—and especially the Malevoiy—could be found within his walls and though his affect was scattered his memory was as keen as the sharpest of blades. No matter how obscure or arcane the reference, Giles Horvath could find its provenance with unerring accuracy, as though the books were there more for the facility of his guests. The actual knowledge was stored quite comprehensively within his own head.

  She asked him about the image that had come to her at Tregare, to complement her vision of the Twelve Great Realms as a series of three interlocking circles—that the cosmos itself operated in similar fashion, the world spinning on an axis, but also revolving around the sun as though the two were tied together by a celestial string for force and energy. From Khory’s memories she had pictures of the night sky in those long-forgotten times and found they didn’t quite match what she herself could view after sunset. The positions of the stars had changed, which meant they moved as well.

  “Wheels upon wheels,” she mused, nibbling on a thumbnail until the Professor rapped her with a ruler to remind her of her manners. His students—common folk all and proud of it—knew better, he expected no less of their Sacred Princess. In her mind’s eye, she stuck out her tongue at him but she took the hint.

  “Coincidence,” she wondered.

  “No such animal” was his dismissive response.

  “A reason then?”

  “Mariners find their path across the water with the aid of the stars. Each solstice and equinox, the sun shines a certain way at a specific time. At regular intervals, the world casts its shadow across the moon and blocks it from sight. Same happens in reverse when the moon blocks the light of the sun.”

  Elora stifled a yawn, swallowing it whole lest her host assume it was because she was bored. Not so, she told herself sternly but without a full measure of conviction, I’m just frightfully tired!

  “You should sleep, child,” the Professor suggested gently, having seen that look in many a class.

  She wanted to protest, but she didn’t have the energy.

  Giles scooped her up, with an ease that made Elora feel like a baby. She’d hardly ever been carried; such familiarities were simply not permitted with the Sacred Princess. After her arrival in Angwyn there was precious little in the way of human contact. A part of her yearned for it, so desperately she dared not think about it, because it hurt too much. At the same time, though, she wasn’t comfortable when it was offered; she couldn’t find a way to deal with it.

  So when Giles Horvath raised her into the cradle of his arms, Elora’s initial reaction was to go stiff as a board. Then her body seized control of the moment and melted at every joint, turning her into deadweight. That made no difference to the scholar. From the way he carried himself and lived, Elora assumed him a classic academic, frail and bookish in form. In the time she’d known him, he’d done nothing to alter that presumption—until tonight. Now that she considered him properly, she recalled that he moved with an ease that bespoke a far more active life. The bulk of him, she’d assumed came from the robes he wore; she was no longer so certain, noting a breadth and solidity to his shoulders that his garments most effectively disguised.

  He set Elora upon the bed in his spare room and tucked her in as best he could, improvising a snug little nest with the down comforter, piling it up and over the sleeping Princess before attending to the coals in the modest hearth, giving them a stir to generate some additional warmth.

  The first impression that came to Elora, even before she opened her eyes, was the smell of steel and worn leather, sword oil and a fierce mix of cooking spices. She didn’t stir for a small while, content to play bunny in a hutch, all roasty-toasty beneath her down quilt.

  “If I didn’t feel so good,” she said, her voice still dull with sleep, “I’d feel terribly guilty and maybe a wee bit ashamed.”

  Giles Horvath chuckled. “There’s no need for either, Elora Danan. You needed the rest.” He carried a tray loaded with cheese and savories, the remains of an egg-and-bacon pie, some bread, and a pot of steaming tea. As Elora wiggled herself upright, keeping the comforter gathered close about her, she noted that the room’s easy chair had likewise been slept in and that a scabbarded broadsword leaned against one arm. Giles wore his University robes but underneath he’d donned boots and trousers and a thigh-length, militarystyle tunic, held at the waist by a belt of sturdy leather.

  “Playin’ sentry, he was,” groused Franjean, from the depths of the pile of pillows that supported Elora.

  “Didn’t trust us to know our business,” grumbled Rool from the other side of her, where he perched on the headboard.

  “We all try to do our parts,” Giles said companionably, as he set the tray on a nearby table and handed a laden plate across to Elora. She noted at once that he’d apportioned the food for three and she made sure to serve her diminutive defenders first, even though the sight and smell of the meal made her ravenous. “And besides,” the Professor finished, “I’ve never heard of any warrior worth the name refusing the offer of an extra sword.”

  “You were expecting visitors,” Elora wondered aloud.

  “I expect nothing,” Giles said, relating a catechism Elora had often heard from Khory. “I try to prepare for everything.”

  There was too much light in the room and the shadows were too small by half; the day, Elora realized, was far closer to noon than sunrise. She wanted to protest against being allowed to sleep so late but kept her peace. Giles was right, she had needed the rest, as much as on the fairy trail from Tregare.

  Unexpectedly, at that thought, a pang caught her heart as a vision of Luc-Jon passed before her, followed by a sharp intake of breath as cruel imagination twisted the sight to her worst nightmare. All the dead she’d ever seen, from all the battles witnessed, presented themselves—slaughtered by sword, or pike, or bludgeon, by arrow, by fire, dead in an instant, or after long and drawn-out agony—all of them now transformed before her mind’s eye into Luc-Jon.

  She heard Puppy howl at the loss of his beloved master and to her horror saw the hound slaughtered as well.

  “Stop it,” she told herself, “stop it stop it stop it!”

  “What happened, Elora? What did you see?” Giles asked her, sitting on the edge of the bed and taking Elora’s hands in his.

  She told him.

  “They’re not dead,
” Rool said simply, hopping down from the headboard to take a stand on her shoulder, where he could look her in the eye.

  “So you say.”

  “So I know, child.” She’d rarely seen the brownie so serious. “We’re bound, the lot of us—by ties of fate and enchantment, of friendship.”

  “Of honor,” Franjean interjected. He was staying hidden. Even now, in what had to be a secure location, they took no chances.

  “When any one of us,” Rool went on, “an’ that includes your young lad, cuts their string, you’ll know. There won’t be a question.”

  “I’ve been thinking,” Elora began, realizing too late the irresistible opportunity she’d just provided her guardians.

  “Ah ha!” cried Franjean.

  “There’s the trouble,” agreed Rool.

  “You’d think, after all these years…”

  “…she’d have learned at least that lesson.”

  “Stop making fun!” she protested, which was futility itself since her plea only inspired the brownies to even more imaginative heights of mockery and derision. “This is important!”

  “Finish your food first, lass,” suggested the Professor. “You’ll feel better. Then we’ll talk.”

  The fare was simple but delicious. However, finishing the meal only served to remind Elora how long it had been since she’d had a proper wash. Refreshed and sated on the inside, she felt a similar yearning to scrub herself clean. Yet again, the Professor had anticipated her desire. A tub awaited her, its water hot enough to fog the bathroom with steam.

  When she emerged, wearing clean clothes to complement her clean body, Elora felt reborn. There was no sign of Giles so she followed her ears and searched out the sounds of bustling activity she soon discovered were coming from his library. It looked like he’d drafted a fair portion of the University’s students, as men and women Elora’s age and older scurried through the stacks, collecting titles, rushing them upstairs to the top-floor loft, replacing them when they were no longer needed, seeking out arcane references in even more obscure tomes, collecting and collating data, running errands.

  “Where’s Franjean?” she asked of Rool before uttering a yelp of startlement as her sidestep of one student placed her right in the path of another. If that one even noticed their near collision as he clattered up the steps, calling out to his fellows on the landing above, Elora felt sure he’d lay the blame on her.

  “With Bannefin.”

  That told her a lot, as in next to nothing, and she used the peremptory arch of her eyebrows to demand more.

  “Constable figures, or so he’s been tellin’ folks, that since Khory’s your minder, an’ us with her, find the warrior, find the brownies, find Elora. All eyes on her, why think about lookin’ anywhere else, hey? She leads a merry chase, we go our merry way.”

  “Before you do,” Giles said, with a little more emphasis, as he stepped off the stairs to join them, “we need to talk.

  “Yesternight, Elora Danan, you told me of the Realms,” Giles began, as he ushered her up to the loft. It was as much a hubbub of activity as the floors below, but far more concentrated. Only a few students were allowed up this final flight of stairs and their actions were as purposeful as a duelist’s. They were all scribes, wearing robes to denote the various stages of their apprenticeship and standing within the guild. Unlike the students below, these few were dressed more for the road than the peaceful confines of University and their weapons hung from a number of racks around the room. There were books on every table and the floor as well, where she and Khory had fought a practice bout with swords during her last visit.

  “It’s hard to square the image of a scribe with all this steel,” she noted, aiming for a jest and missing her mark by a wide margin.

  Giles grinned anyway. “Stodgy and hidebound talk for one who’s journeyed to the Realm of the Dragons.”

  “What’s happening here, Professor?”

  “We’re scholars, you present us with a conundrum. On whose correct solution just happens to rest the fate of the world and its peoples, which includes us. Suffice to say, we thrive on challenge.”

  He sat her down at the big table and perched himself on it facing her and as he spoke he assumed to himself more and more the manner of a teacher, synthesizing learning and passing it on. He began by holding his hands before her with fingers broadly splayed, as if he were balancing a bowl in each.

  “You spoke last evening of the Great Realms,” he said, “existing within a network of three interlocking wheels. Twelve Realms, three wheels, four each: the Circle of the World, the Circle of the Flesh, the Circle of the Spirit. Each Realm marks a stage on an ascending spiral from the purely physical to the purely spiritual.

  “Evidently,” he continued, “you represent a fourth circle that overlies the other three. You touch them all, you link them all. In some respects, they much resemble gears in a celestial machine. The action of one affects the others.

  “But if Thorn Drumheller’s right, if what you say the dragons told him years past is true, then this world isn’t the only world, just as our sun isn’t the only light in the sky. We know there are lines of magical power running through the globe.”

  “The Major and Minor Arcana,” Elora spoke up, giving the grid its proper name.

  “Precisely. The Magus Points, where those lines intersect, are where we find the World Gates that give instant access to both sides of the Veil, from the Realms of the purely physical—like the Daikini—to those more closely bound to this power we call magic, the Realms of Faery and the Malevoiy. They’re also where you’ll tend to find the residences of most sorcerers and, regrettably, the most serious infestations of magical creatures such as ogres and trolls. Magic calls to its own.

  “But we must never forget, Elora Danan, that the entire world is as much alive as we. Our bodies change over the course of our lives, so does the world itself. As a consequence, over the course of ages, those nexuses, the Magus Points, move. Tregare and Sandeni itself were places where tremendous power once manifested itself. Now that power is but a memory. Other locales now possess it. What can you deduce from that?”

  “If we are alive,” Elora said excitedly, catching no small measure of the Professor’s enthusiasm, “and the world is alive, why not the cosmos? Why do we assume the Arcana exist only in the world?”

  “Consider the cosmos as a great machine,” he suggested. “Wheels upon wheels upon wheels, all turning in concert like clockwork gears. At the same time, think of a spiderweb, with lines of energy radiating outward from some central hub. What does that tell you?”

  She considered the Professor’s question no small while before replying and this time her words were hesitant, carefully chosen.

  “Everything—turns? The world on its axis, giving us day and night. And further it revolves around the sun, to give us seasons. I’ve seen the sun through the ‘eyes’ of firedrakes, and it spins, too, same as the world, casting off huge streamers of fire that curl back on themselves in arcs so huge this entire globe would be lost within them. When hurricanes come, and tornadoes, the winds blow in great circles; that same natural effect applies to solar winds.”

  “And for everything that spins,” Giles said, “there is a center. An ‘eye’ of the storm. The pattern replicates through the entirety of nature, from the great to the very small. Look at the hair on a baby’s head, spiraling outward from the back of the skull to cover the entire scalp. As for the spiderweb, that’s my own little conceit. If such is the structure of the world, and if the world has so much in common with the cosmos, we should find ley lines through the stars, just as through the earth.

  “Each star is a source of energy,” he continued, words and gestures becoming more animated as he warmed to his subject, swept away by the joy of discovery, “as is every world, every component of that world, every living thing, every person. To a great or little degree
, we all generate what we call magic, and we serve as receptors for it as well. What makes a sorcerer is the ability to perceive and manipulate those forces.

  “You mustn’t think of things solely in two dimensions, that’s the error in your ‘wheel’ hypothesis. Consider the elements—the three Circles and the Great Realms that compose them—rather as spheres. The Realms may travel along a flat plane, as the world seems to about the sun, but the prominences of energy they cast forth erupt in every direction. There is power innate to our own world, demarked by the Major and Minor Arcana and their consequent Magus Points. But there is also the arcane energy generated by our own star, that interacts with the world at definable points on the celestial calendar. From that, we speculate that further ley lines of energy exist, generated by the other stars in the sky, some radiating from a central point too distant to be perceived, of a degree that beggars the imagination.

  “Remember what I said about the spiderweb, Elora. Each strand in and of itself is quite fragile. Possibly able to support the spider but wholly inadequate to the task of catching prey. But the finished web is a masterpiece of engineering. Each segment in the latticework builds upon the other, anchors one another, providing mutual integrity and support. So it is, I believe, with the ley lines. Individually, their strength is limited. In aggregate, as a network, the possibilities become transcendent.

  “If that’s true for the world, might it not apply as well to the cosmos? Draw for yourself a schematic of the world, based solely on the network of the Arcana. Now expand that perception to include the stars as well. The same principle has to hold—that points of intersection exist where the force we call magic becomes stronger. The degree of that strength varies in proportion to the capacity of the ley lines that cross. But instead of channeling the energy of a single world, imagine the potential inherent in a multitude!