Lingering Haze (The Elusive Strain Book 1)

by James Berardinelli

  “Are the rulers in the great cities like those men? So venal and calculating? They’re not at all like the elders in Aeris,” said Samell. Like me, the experience had soured him. In fact, the same could be said of all my companions except Gabriel.

  “Oh no, the leaders in cities are much more political than those men. At least with these elders, you can speak plainly. With kings and queens, you have to understand diplomacy and courtliness.”

  “So what’s next for you?”

  “Rebuilding my fledgling empire, such as it is…or was. I don’t relish starting again and with only one hand, but there’s no help for it. I’m glad to be alive and grateful to you. Without your help, I doubt I would have made it back from Aeris. Best of luck on the rest of your journey.”

  I spent some time wandering the streets of West Fork in Samell and Esme’s company. We saw things through different eyes. To them, this was a large, spacious place - far more cosmopolitan and sophisticated than their village of birth. To me, it was cramped and squalid. Even the gentry’s houses seemed small and inadequate compared to the middle-class homes where I came from. The town smelled of urine and feces - the result of inadequate (or non-existent) sanitation. Open privy pits were scattered all around the village and people could be seen doing their business from the roads. I had to remind myself that this was normal here and that my prejudices were unreasonable. Like Dorothy, I wasn’t in Kansas anymore (not that I had ever been there, at least that I recalled).

  “How are we going to find a guide?” asked Samell, voicing my unspoken question.

  “Maybe the innkeeper will suggest someone.” It was a vague hope but the only one I had.

  “Try the marketplace,” suggested Esme. “They sell everything there. Clothing, jewelry, food, women…why not information?”

  The marketplace was an open-air park where about two-dozen merchants and vendors had set up stalls to hawk their wares. Located north of the main town, this spot - about the size of a quarter football field - was one of the most frequently visited places in West Fork and, as a result, it was crowded, noisy, and (especially for someone with an enhanced sense of smell) malodorous.

  I had barely set foot into the place when I was accosted by a seedy-looking man with a hooked nose and an artificial smile. He was carrying a long, thin stake upon which were skewered a half-dozen roasted animals. The scrawny things, which looked a little like ill-fed squirrels, were charred in places but the spices they had been marinated in smelled tasty. Against my will, my stomach rumbled. It had been a while since my inadequate morning meal.

  The greasy vendor, noting that my eyes were fixed on his wares, sensed a possible customer. “Miss looks hungry,” he said. “My habishoms will fill your belly, no?”

  I had no idea what a ‘habishom’ was but the scent was weakening my resolve not to spend anything in the marketplace. Our money was for necessities not frivolities.

  “No,” said Samell. “And those don’t look like any habishoms I’ve seen.”

  “They are specially bred for cooking,” the vendor argued defensively, pouting excessively to show that he was hurt at being challenged.

  “Miss looks famished. They will make her feel good.”

  I pulled Samell aside. Putting my mouth next to his ear so he could hear me over the marketplace din, I asked, “What is a habishom?”

  “It’s a rotund rodent that spends most of the day rooting around for grubs in fields and gardens. They’re usually fat and sedate but surprisingly difficult to catch. My mother cooks them once in a while. These look more like dwarf rats.”

  I started at that. Regardless of how good the man’s wares might smell, I recoiled at the thought of eating them. The vendor caught my look of disgust and made one last appeal. “These are not normal habishoms. They are…ahem…filigree habishoms.”

  “They’re dwarf rats,” said Samell in a tone that brooked no disagreement.

  The aggrieved vendor looked shocked. “No! I would never sell rats. They are filigree habishoms.”

  Samell took my hand and steered me away from the rat salesman. At that moment, I realized the exchanged had not gone unnoticed. We were being watched. A tall, dark-skinned man sitting in an apparently empty stall fixed us with an unwavering gaze. I drew Samell’s attention to him. “Who do you suppose that is.”

  “A soothsayer,” said Samell. “You can tell by the necklace. We had one visit Aeris a few years ago.”

  The jewelry in question appeared to be a collection of uncut gems - rubies, emeralds, sapphires, diamonds, and other exotic stones I didn’t recognize - strung together by some form of cordage. It wasn’t pretty but it was noticeable. Back in my world, I suspected it would have gemologists salivating.

  There was something magnetic about his stare and it drew me in his direction despite Samell’s cautioning against it. The soothsayer regarded me calmly; there was nothing menacing in his demeanor. He sat placidly behind an empty table, his back ramrod straight and his face devoid of emotion. His pate was bare and it was difficult to discern his age from his features, although I estimated him to be more than twice as old as me.

  Once I had closed to within a half-dozen feet, he rose unhurriedly and executed a formal bow. “Greetings, Summoner.”

  His salutation caused a ripple of shock. I glanced toward Samell but he didn’t seem surprised.

  “Don’t be alarmed,” said the man. “I am Marluk. My sight allows me to see things others may miss.”

  I extended a hand, which he took after a moment’s hesitation, as if unsure what was expected of him. “My name is Janelle. This is Samell.” I was about to introduce Esme but then realized she had vanished into the crowd, headed off on her own marketplace adventure.

  “You’re a soothsayer?”

  “Some call me that. I prefer the term ‘visionary.’ It’s a better description of who I am. I know why you are in West Fork, where you are bound, and why you have come to this world. I don’t claim to have all the answers you crave but I may be able to give perspective and possibly some aid on your quest. If this interests you, I invite you to visit my abode this evening. I can promise you a good meal and open talk. We have entered an era, Summoner, when no person of conscience can afford to stand by idly. What happened at NewTown is only the beginning.”

  Chapter Eighteen: The Princess and the Guide

  I don’t know what I had been expecting but Marluk’s home surprised me. Maybe I had thought there would be skulls, bones, beads, pins, and such, but his two-room hovel was as plain and unadorned as any of the other peasants’ dwellings I had visited in NewTown. Houses here, like in Aeris, were shelters not places in which lives were built. In the world I came from, homes were central to the social order. Here, where property was primarily communal, they were incidental.

  There were no chairs. The four of us - myself, Samell, Esme, and our host - sat cross-legged on the hard-packed dirt floor in a circle. We ate in silence, sipping a tasty broth and wolfing down a vegetarian dish that had been liberally seasoned with exotic spices not unlike those used in the marketplace by the rat seller. It was accompanied by a drink that reminded me of a fermented cider - sweet but slightly tangy. Whatever else he might be, Marluk was a good cook. Then, with our bellies filled and our thirst quenched, it was time for talk.

  “Summoner, it is an honor to welcome you to my house,” said Marluk, repeating the greeting he had offered when we arrived earlier in the evening. “I have awaited your coming.”

  “You knew?”

  “The signs were there for anyone who understands how to read them. But the old ways are mostly forgotten across the civilized portions of this great land. That’s part of the reason why we’re in such dire circumstances. Men have lost their way and Summoners have forgotten their role. So we seek for our salvation in those not born of our world.”

  I suppressed a sigh. I supposed it would have been too much to expect Marluk to be a plain speaker. Self-identified mystics loved riddles. Backus was like that and I g
uessed the same would be true of Bergeron, if I ever met him. I absently wondered whether, if I was lucky enough to grow old (something I seriously doubted), I would become like that.

  “You don’t understand me,” he said, reading my expression. “Forgive me. I keep my own counsel too often. Let me start from the beginning, at least insofar as there is a beginning. What do you know about the history of Summoners?”

  “Not much.” Actually, nothing would be closer to the truth. Backus had taught me a lot about the gods, a little about the history of Aeris and its place in the world, and almost nothing about Summoners beyond what I needed to know to use my powers.

  “I don’t pretend to be an expert but, in my land across the great angry sea, all children study history, especially those that, like me, share a privileged upbringing. Summoners have been around for as long as the Unmagical. Their original purpose, as determined by the Quartet, was to act as caretakers for men. The word for Summoner in my language is the same as the word for Servant. You see, although the gods turn their eyes toward us every day, their day-to-day cares are celestial. A thousand-thousand years for us is like a day for them. So they created Summoners and gave them magic to protect and nurture the rest of their creations.

  “Magic - and I’m sure you know this - comes from the transformation of the raw energy of emotion. But emotion is not a clean source. It’s a living thing, fed from our passions and desires. Thus, it would be foolish to think of magic as merely a fuel to be harnessed and dismissed. It is, after a fashion, alive. It must be tamed. It must be controlled. And, above all, it must be managed. What many Summoners fail to realize is that not every act of magic uses all of the energy. There is always a residue and, when released, it is absorbed by the elements. And that’s where the problems begin.

  “Once, there were many Summoners - perhaps as many as one for every one hundred people. They lived all over the world, marrying and inter-marrying, passing their abilities to offspring, and doing their duty to Summon another when their mortal coil was at its end. During that age, they controlled the magic. They found ways to siphon off the excess and use it for the good of all people. But, over time, their numbers dwindled. They became less social. And they began to neglect the Excess.

  “A Summoner named Alberto, who lived ten hundred years ago, saw the danger. He warned that magic, like any living thing, had the potential for sentience. He coined terms for thinking creatures born of magic. You may have heard of them: reavers and daemons. He explained how magic, brewing in the cauldron of elemental power, would give genesis to these things - animate, puissant expressions of their nature. This is now happening. Excess has reached a saturation point and living, thinking beings are forming from it. But they are malignant in nature, twisted and warped by the way they have grown and developed. And there are far too few Summoners for the threat to be contained or managed. They pose a mortal danger to this world. Extinction is their goal - extinction of every being not of their nature. Plant life is already being subjugated; animal life is being exterminated.”

  Marluk’s tale was so extreme that it might easily have been dismissed as the raving of a madman, but the evidence all around - the reavers, the Verdant Blight, NewTown - confirmed the most outlandish of his statements. Deep down, I suspected this was a man I should listen to and whose words I should take to heart.

  “You said you knew I was coming, and you identified me in the marketplace.”

  Marluk nodded, making a steeple with his index fingers under his chin. At that moment, he looked every inch the mystic. “I have been gifted with sight. I suspect it’s not that different from your magical senses although my abilities come from a deep commune with the land and its creatures. I don’t know who Summoned you, but the Summoning was felt throughout the world and its ripples died near here. It was then that I knew you must come to West Fork eventually, seeking the only Summoner in the west, Bergeron. I heard the rumors of your arrival last night, little rumblings spoken by the most notorious gossip-mongers, and I knew when I saw you this afternoon who you were. There is something foreign about you. You hide it well and those without attuned eyes might miss it but I can tell you aren’t from this world. Only Summoners travel so far.”

  Even Backus with his great years and experience as a self-trained Summoner didn’t know as much as Marluk about the ways of magic and those who used it. A suspicion formed in my mind. “How old are you?” My mother had once said it was impolite to ask a woman that question but she hadn’t said anything about a man.

  He smiled but deflected the question. “Underneath all the seeming normality in West Fork, there’s an undercurrent of uneasiness. What really happened in NewTown? That’s what they’re whispering. No one can fathom the complete destruction of a village.”

  “But you can?”

  “I can,” he said. “I have no desire to see it and I can read in your eyes that to stay away is the right decision. There’s nothing we can do about NewTown now. It’s gone. But the forces brought to bear against it remain. They fester. And they won’t rest. Aeris is too small to be worth their time or effort except for completeness. That makes West Fork the next logical target. And I doubt we will fare better than our neighbors to the north despite our greater numbers and quasi-preparedness. Do you know what caused the destruction?”

  Samell cleared his throat before answering in my stead. “We think they were fire reavers but we never saw them. Earth reavers attacked Aeris. Janelle helped drive them back. We were attacked on the road by an air reaver. She killed it. We didn’t see what happened at NewTown but it’s not hard to guess.”

  “They are moving in concert. We probably have less time than we hope for or need.”

  “What about water?” I asked suddenly. Fire, air, earth, water - there were four elements.

  “That’s the question, isn’t it?” replied Marluk. “But maybe we’re too far from the seas to know the answer. Or maybe, as I read somewhere, the water reavers went extinct long ago. Reavers have been around for many, many generations but it’s only now, with their numbers swelling, that they’re becoming aggressive. That, and something else. Something intelligent acting as a guiding force.”

  “A daemon?” whispered Samell.

  “A daemon. And if that’s the case, we have much to fear.”

  I didn’t know what a “daemon” was but, since they were pronouncing the word a lot like “demon”, I could make a few assumptions. Reavers and daemons? What had I gotten myself into? Not that I’d had much choice in the matter. Had any of this been the result of my free will? Until I recovered my full memories, I wouldn’t know the answer to that.

  “We need a guide to reach Summoner Bergeron. Can you take us?”

  Marluk appeared surprised by the request. “I’m not good on the road,” he said. The regret in his voice was genuine. “I think you’d find me more of a hindrance than an asset. But I should be able to find someone with the requisite knowledge of the western countryside to get you there. I doubt anyone around here knows exactly where the Summoner lives but we all have a general idea. He’s a recluse and doesn’t welcome visitors but I’m sure he’s as aware as I am that the rules of the past no longer apply.

  “While you’re seeking him out, I can remain your eyes and ears in West Fork. I have some influence, although not as much as I might like to have, but I may be able to convince some of the less skeptical men and women of means that the threat is real. Publicly, the elders deny any danger. Privately, I believe they think differently.”

  His words echoed Gabriel’s. “Someone else said something similar, that they had to present an unconcerned charade of calmness to keep from starting a panic.”

  “Whoever told you that knows the pulse of this town. I may be able to nudge them not to change their ‘official’ stance but to institute covert preparations. Who can say whether anything would make any difference if an army of fire reavers descends on us? West Fork might be able to raise an emergency militia of 400 souls but I doubt that would
be sufficient to stave off destruction…unless a trained Summoner stood with us. And that’s why it’s imperative for you to reach your goal as quickly as possible and for me to do whatever I can to aid you. To that end, although I can’t provide you with a guide, I can offer you a companion: my only daughter, Ramila.”

  My first inclination was to refuse. The last thing I wanted was someone else to be responsible for. But then I realized how ungrateful that would be and, in truth, I needed all the help I could get. My current companions were resourceful and well-meaning but they were as overwhelmed by the circumstances as I was. I expressed my thanks.

  “She is strong with a blade and bow, knowledgeable in flora and poultices and, perhaps most important to your purpose, possessed of some of my…talents. I have not yet spoken to her but I have no doubt she will readily agree. As a princess in exile, she understands duty and will know where her responsibility in this matter lies.”

  A princess? I supposed it could be a figure of speech but that wasn’t how it sounded. Marluk was obviously more than just an obscure soothsayer living in a simple shack in a remote village. But, from the way he had pointedly avoided my question about his age, I suspected that probing him about his history would be fruitless. By the end of the night’s conversation, despite repeated efforts on my part, I discovered that to be true. Marluk was willing to talk openly about a great many subjects but his own story wasn’t among them.

  As we parted for the evening, he promised, “Ramila will come to your inn tomorrow morning. She will bring with her someone willing to guide you to the Summoner. Should you need me, seek me here or in the marketplace. If I’m not in either place, ask after me. I am known and someone will be able to locate me.”

  On the way back to the inn, Samell asked the obvious question, “Can we trust him?”

  Could we? Everything about Marluk seemed sincere but the man’s unwillingness to discuss his past made me wary. Then again, I was notoriously close-mouthed about my own history. The soothsayer’s secrets might have nothing whatsoever to do with our current situation.