Sorcerers' Isle

by D. P. Prior

  The sorcerer pointed out things along the way: squirrels, a red-headed woodpecker, vultures ripping into the remains of a snake.

  “Looks like a death adder,” he said. “Or rather, a dead one.”

  It was nothing new to Tey. She’d seen such things in and around the village, and she knew Theurig prized the snakes for their venom.

  “A sorcerer must continuously study and categorize,” Slyndon Grun explained. “It is our calling to comprehend the world, to know each plant, each insect, each bird and beast inside out, and then put them to good use.”

  “For hoodwinking?”

  He laughed. “Legerdemain is our bread and butter. Keeps the dogs in their place and allows a sorcerer to pursue his heart’s desire.”

  Tey wasn’t sure she wanted to know what that was, but Slyndon Grun didn’t wait for her to ask.

  “Knowledge, my dear. Wisdom. The unveiled truths of the Weyd.”

  “The Weyd that is no-thing?” she said.

  Slyndon Grun rolled his eyes. “To be no-thing is simply another way of saying ‘not of this world,’ ‘the transcendent,’ ‘the outsider.’ To the Crafters who fashioned the world, if certain apocryphal pre-histories are to be believed, the Weyd is the wellspring of the sorcery that undergirds all there is, all there has ever been.”

  “But Theurig—”

  “Thinks magic doesn’t exist. I tell my candidates the same thing. And strictly speaking, we are being truthful. What clansfolk take for magic is largely superstition, manipulation, sleight of hand. But there is more to it than that. At one time sorcery held sway in the world, till the ancient war that ended its reign. It was a dire power, honed for destruction. We are told it was a good thing it was lost. But power once acquired is never truly forgotten. It is more the case that those who cling to it wish us to think it so.”

  “Sorcerers?” Did they pretend to possess powers that were fake, only to hide the fact of their real magic?

  Slyndon Grun scoffed and shook his head. “I’ve already said more than I usually do. Lore must be earned, Tey Moonshine. Each of us must follow the trail of evidence where it leads us. Most sorcerers lose sight of the goal and end their days with a knowledge of flora and fauna, methods of beguilement, and how to win at seven-card. Some rise higher, only to have their heads lopped off for seeing too much. Others”—and he chewed the words like gristle now—“prosper from stolen lore, or benefit from friends in far-off places.”

  Just as she’d thought all along: magic was real, only it wasn’t what most people expected it to be. That much she’d worked out for herself. But this… sorcerers ignorant of true magic. Was it so hard to find? And who were they, “those who cling to it” while leading others to believe the knowledge was lost? Who were these “friends in far-off places”?

  She glanced at Slyndon Grun’s face, saw that he had said all he was going to on the subject. To her surprise, the Shedim remained silent. Maybe it had nothing to add. Or maybe it did but was biding its time, meting out scraps of knowledge like breadcrumbs to trap a rat.

  But there was still something the sorcerer had said that confused her.

  “What’s seven-card?”

  “It’s a game, Tey, one we sorcerers play at our gatherings. Coins to the winner, or more often knowledge: ancient writings, artifacts from before the time of the Four Invasions, snatches of oral tradition preserved in rhyming couplets.” With a conspiratorial wink, he added, “Other things of worth.”

  Once, they stopped so Slyndon Grun could gather mushrooms growing in rough circles and place them in a draw-string pouch.

  “Are they poisonous?” Tey asked in her little girl’s voice, thinking of Theurig making the powder that gave Vrom Mowry the rot.

  “You know how to tell which ones are edible and which are not?” the sorcerer asked.

  Tey shrugged. In the village, Theurig’s crones were the only ones allowed to harvest mushrooms. Knowing which were safe to eat was a gift granted by the Weyd, or so they claimed.

  “Like anything worth knowing,” Slyndon Grun said, “there’s no simple answer and no one way. Is it gilled or bolete, spongey beneath the cap? What color are the spores? What does it smell like? If you split the stalk, is it fleshy inside? If you cut the gills, do they ooze liquid?”

  “And how they taste?” Tey asked.

  “Ah, there I would urge caution. I might occasionally nibble some to aid with identification, but I have years of experience with fungi. One bite of the wrong kind, even if you spit it out, and it won’t go well for you.”

  “Like the…” Tey caught herself before she could say “rot.” That might arouse his suspicions. Presumably, she wasn’t supposed to know about how Vrom had contracted the disease. “And these ones?” she said, as Slyndon Grun fastened his pouch and stowed it back in his robe.

  The sorcerer smiled and clapped a hand on her shoulder. “Just don’t eat too many at one time. Their main practical use is for persuading others of the reality of spirits.”

  Tey eyed his bejeweled fingers as he gave her a reassuring squeeze. Her mind threw up an image of the Hand of Vilchus scuttling through the air. Maggots crawled beneath her skin. At first she thought it was her reaction to the sorcerer’s touch, but then she realized she felt no such disgust. If anything, Slyndon Grun was much kinder than she’d dared imagine. No, the sensation was not her own, even though it came from within her.

  [What you did… upon the tumulus… to Snaith.]

  There was a quaver in the Shedim’s voice.

  [It must not happen again. Not without death. What power you imbibed from his seed is fleeting, wasted. As with stolen essence, only the taking of life will seal it in, make it truly yours. No man must touch you like that and live. You must take and never give back. Otherwise it costs us too much, both you and I.]

  “Snaith did not touch me,” Tey whispered under her breath. “I did it to him. It was my choice.”

  [Then you defiled yourself for nothing.]

  Clearly, the Shedim didn’t know men, and it certainly didn’t know Snaith and his obsessions. What she’d left him would haunt his thoughts and dreams, keep him from ever forgetting her. And one day, if he earned the freedom of a fully fledged sorcerer, one day he’d come looking for her.

  But the crawl of maggots beneath her skin… The Shedim wasn’t just disappointed; it wasn’t just angry. There was more to it than that, something she had started to suspect back in the cavern of coal. It was revolted by what she’d done to Snaith, and when she had offered herself to it that time it had fled in abject horror.

  Tey became aware Slyndon Grun was speaking to her. He withdrew his hand from her shoulder.

  “What just happened?” he asked.

  [Say nothing,] the Shedim hissed.

  “Was it my touch?”

  Tey lowered her eyes.

  “Theurig told me you were… sensitive.” The sorcerer frowned; almost seemed to wince. “Please, forgive me.”

  Forgive him? A sorcerer was asking her for forgiveness? All he’d done was lay his hand on her shoulder. Khunt Moonshine had treated her like a dog and drained her essence for years, and he’d never said sorry. It didn’t feel right. Guilt for the things she’d thought about Slyndon Grun, how she’d judged him by his appearance, bubbled to the surface. So much guilt she didn’t know where it all came from, didn’t know what to do with it.

  But the Grave Girl did. She pushed straight past Slyndon Grun and stormed through the trees.

  “Tey!” he called. “Not that way. Tey!”

  A wolf howled in the distance. Another answered, and then another.

  She turned back to the sorcerer, and he held up his hands.

  “My fault.” He touched a finger to his lips. “I should have warned you. That is not the way we want to go. Wolvers Clan, remember? How do you think they got their name?”

  Who cares? Tey thought. The recklessness was upon her. For a split second, she envisioned yellow eyes rolling with pleasure as a wolf ripped out chunks
of her flesh.

  “And no, I don’t mean the stories your elders probably told you about werewolves.” Slyndon Grun’s voice snapped her back to reality. “That’s what the Wolvers want you to think, the kind of scaremongering that ensures they are left well alone, and feared if they decide to go on the offensive. But there are real wolves in the hilly land they occupy, and the Wolvers have grown adept at hunting them. They eat their flesh for strength and wear their skins.

  “Now,” he said, “the clans would never dare harm a sorcerer, but wolves, alas, are not possessed of the same good sense and breeding. Our route will ensure our safety, while taking us right under their noses.”

  Slyndon Grun pushed his way through an overgrowth of bracken. Tey followed him into a depression and watched as he cleared a pile of brown leaves and deadfall. He uncovered a rusty half-dome set into the ground, a small metal wheel rising from its center.

  Tey was shaking from what she’d imagined doing—throwing herself to the wolves and using them to end it all. It was the same thing that had happened with the bear. As Slyndon Grun turned the wheel and the half-dome began to hinge upward on one side, she started to moan and whimper, building toward full-blown panic. She couldn’t go back underground, not after the Hand.

  “It’s quite safe,” Slyndon Grun said, coming toward her, leaning his weight on his walking stick. The bronze skull at its top leered at Tey. “There’s a system of tunnels down there. They run for miles in every direction.”

  She studied him closely, searching out any hint of deception. But his eyes were inscrutable, dreadfully serious. All she had to go on was the rosiness of his cheeks, the gentle curve of his smile. His face looked warm and fleshy, and she felt herself almost pitying him, feeling sorry for him and ever more guilty that she continued to judge him. Thus far, he had shown her only kindness, and that was a rare gift to be cherished.

  Tey nodded she was ready, and she followed Slyndon Grun to the opening the dome had covered. An iron ladder ran down the wall of a brickwork shaft as far as she could see. Grime-covered crystals set into the walls gave off a milky glow. She looked at the sorcerer for an explanation.

  “All we know is that these tunnels are extremely old,” he said. “As you shall soon see, I am known for my library of ancient texts. Cawdor’s The Four Invasions of Branikdür places the tunnels before the coming of the Shedim, which itself preceded the rise of the Hélum Empire.”

  That grabbed Tey’s attention. She took a long, shuddering breath and spoke in the voice of a woman. “How much do you know of the Shedim?”

  “Only what Cawdor tells us, and then only what I can remember. I had to let that particular book go.” He glanced at Tey, let her know he was regretful. “And believe me, Cawdor’s not always being literal. But here and there he is consistent with other historians of the isle. I suspect the Archmage knows more than the rest of us, but if he does, he’s not saying.”

  “Archmage?”

  “You’ll find out soon enough. We are a happy bunch, we sorcerers, under the paternal care of the Weyd’s vicar on Branikdür.”

  Was he being sarcastic? If he was, he quickly hid the fact, bowing his head and touching two fingers to his forehead. “May he be forever blessed, and,” he said, flashing a look of warning at Tey, “may he be spoken of only in secret, among friends. Among sorcerers and their charges. Come on now, let’s not dither. You first.”

  Slyndon Grun set down his stick and held her hands as she angled her bad leg over the mouth of the shaft. With the foot of her good leg, she found a rung on the ladder. The sorcerer guided her hands to the stringers, and she was able to descend by taking her weight on her arms, reaching for each successive rung with her working foot.

  Slyndon Grun’s bulk above her shut out the grey light streaming down from outside and left them in the pallid glow of the crystals. Tey wondered what gave them their light, whether it was natural, like the tails of the lightning bugs, or if the crystals, like the evidence Slyndon Grun had spoken of, were some long-buried footprint of magic.

  At the bottom, she found herself in a tunnel with an arched ceiling. The glowing crystals continued along the walls on both sides, illuminating cracked brickwork and the dark lines of damp from where water had at one time come up to almost head height.

  Slyndon Grun took the lead now, clutching his walking stick to his chest with both hands, the bronze skull glinting with reflected light. The thud of his footfalls, the scrape of Tey’s leg echoed along the passageway. Tey stiffened when there came an answering growl.

  “Don’t mind them,” Slyndon Grun said. “Aberrations forgotten by the world. They’ve had more than one taste of my stick, and they’d have to be stupid or half-starved to risk another beating.”

  [Sorcerous hybrids,] the Shedim whispered in her veins. [Discards from before the age of the Wakeful.] There was scorn in its tone, and a great deal left unsaid. But what the Shedim seemed unwilling to share, Slyndon Grun more than made up for.

  “Cawdor recounts the myth of a prehistoric age of great wonder, with Branikdür at its heart. There was an unimaginable abuse of power that warped all life exposed to it. The inhabitants of this isle retreated below ground and carved out this network of tunnels. But they were already infected, and generation by generation, they began to change. Their absence from the world above left Branikdür vulnerable to the dark sorcery of the First Invasion. A classic case of going from bad to worse. The way Cawdor tells it, the second invasion was a blessing, a liberation.”

  The Shedim scoffed.

  “And the others?” Tey asked.

  “All civilizations rise and fall,” Slyndon Grun said, “and with them either the light burns brighter or darkness returns.”

  “And now?”

  The sorcerer chuckled. “Depends on your view of Hélum. But here on Branikdür, remote from the heart of the Empire, I like to think we hold a candle flame to the night. Then again, that depends on what you perceive as darkness and what you perceive as light. You’ll have to forgive me if I’m being equivocal. It’s part and parcel of a sorcerer’s role.”

  Something squat rushed out of the shadows, gibbering insanely. Gangly legs, sinewy arms, bloated face with a single crimson eye. Slyndon Grun’s stick came down with a thwack, and the creature fled screeching.

  “I’m going to have to start feeding them,” the sorcerer said. “Preferably with treated meat that will engender an outbreak of the rot.” He glanced at Tey for a reaction. She caught herself between a frown and a knowing smile.

  “Theurig told me you were a clever one,” Slyndon Grun said. “And sly with it.”

  So, Theurig had known she’d been spying on him. The fact that he’d said nothing meant he hadn’t felt the need to; that he’d been one step ahead of her all the time. How much more had Theurig known? How much had he worked out for himself? And more worrying, how much had he told Slyndon Grun? It made her feel exposed, naked. More than that, it made her feel foolish, a child in the world of grown-ups. She didn’t know what else to do other than be that child, avert her eyes, and wait for her punishment.

  “Oh, I’m not saying it’s a bad thing to be sly,” Slyndon Grun said. “And neither is Theurig. He just felt, given the sensitive nature of what you thought you knew, it might be best for you to experience more of what Branikdür has to offer. Happens all the time among us sorcerers: people discovering things they’re not supposed to, being sent further and further north for their troubles. The clans up there are too busy fighting the cold to give a damn about forbidden knowledge. I tell you, it’s the fate most of us labor to avoid. The problem is, sorcerers are inquisitive by nature; it’s what suits us to the task. The more we know, the more we feel compelled to find out, and sooner or later we run up against the Archmage. Which leads us neatly to your second lesson under my tutelage: It isn’t so much what you know, it’s who knows you know it.” He pressed a finger to his lips and continued along the tunnel.

  Tey followed the sorcerer along a series of twists
and turns and switchbacks. It was a maze, and one she would soon get lost in by herself. They passed countless steel doors, hemp bags stuffed with sand stacked in front of them to waist height. Outside a few were brass tubes the size of her little finger scattered across the floor. Slyndon Grun stooped to show her one, sealed at one end, open the other, and blackened with a powdery residue.

  “I use them for dried herbs and the like,” the sorcerer said, pocketing it. “A stopper of cork and they’re tight as a virgin’s…” He coughed into his fist and resumed walking. “Air-tight. Fit to task.”

  From time to time, pinpricks of red light sprang up at the intersections, too many to count. Tey squinted at them and they drew into focus: single eyes, watching her every move.

  When the sorcerer stopped at another ladder and gestured for her to climb up first, squat figures began creeping along the tunnel toward them, both fore and aft. Slyndon Grun reached into his pocket, produced a vial of powder and another of liquid. Hanging by the inside of her elbow from a rung midway to the ceiling, Tey watched him add a drop of liquid to the powder vial, which he then flung at the creatures approaching from the front. There was a fizz and a bang, and smoke filled the tunnel. Amid a chorus of gibbering, the creatures in front fled, and those behind slunk back, tentative, eyes narrowed to scarlet slits. When Slyndon Grun raised his skull-topped stick and roared at them, they dispersed back into the shadows.

  Tey struggled up the ladder till she reached the concave inside of another dome lid, a metal wheel set into its center.

  “Turn it to the—”

  “I’ve got it,” she said, already spinning the wheel. It didn’t take a genius. She pushed her shoulder against the lid and it creaked open. Icy rain showered down, drenching her shawl and splashing the floor beneath.

  “Sodding weather,” Slyndon Grun cursed as he came up the ladder behind her. “If Gosynag the Grey ever decides to step out of the realm of fantasy into my world, so help me I’ll brain him with my stick.”