Casket of Souls

by Lynn Flewelling

  “I hope so, but there’s no way of knowing until I examine these,” Thero replied as kindly as he could. There was nothing to be gained by raising false hopes. “Seregil, I need to mark up your floor.”

  Seregil and Alec moved the dining table and chairs to one side and rolled up the carpet, baring a patch of floor large enough for Thero to chalk a suitable circle and the necessary symbols of protection.

  “I need two bowls. Silver if possible.”

  Elsbet fetched two silver wine cups from the sideboard. “Will these do?”

  “Yes, those are quite suitable.”

  Sitting down in the center of the circle with the bottles and cups, Thero spoke the sealing spell and felt the circle of magical protection close around him. Nothing could get in or out of it. Holding the milky bottle between his hands, he began the incantation of intent.

  In his mind’s eye Thero was surrounded by a greasy black cloud. But as he’d suspected, it was simpler and less weighty; there was no trace of the necromancer’s dark god. No, this was something else entirely, and as alien to him as the magic of the Retha’noi had been. He concentrated harder, trying to get past the initial sensations to something solid.

  Atre owned this. He’d owned it for a long time. A very long time. He’d handled it, filled it, sealed it many times. And drunk from it. Thero had a fleeting sense of the tall actor Brader drinking, too, but none of the others. He tried to catch a clearer memory of what Atre actually did with the phials, but it wouldn’t come, perhaps because of the magic itself.

  While the physical sensations he was getting from it were mildly unpleasant, he felt nothing malevolent. Trusting that, he cut the wax at the neck of the phial with his ivory knife, then carefully worked the cork free.

  Nothing happened, but a bitter smell rose in his nostrils. It wasn’t a physical scent, but rather a magical emanation.

  “I’m not certain what it does, but I think they are elixirs of some sort,” he told the others as he poured it into one of the silver cups.

  “You’re not going to drink it?” exclaimed Alec. “What if it’s poison?”

  “I doubt that. I saw Atre drinking from it.” Thero swirled the milky liquid around in the cup. “Still, I wish I had some creature to test it on.”

  “You’re not using my cat,” said Seregil.

  “I could check the rat trap in the kitchen,” said Alec.

  Thero nodded. “A rat would do nicely.”

  Alec hurried out, and returned a few moment’s later with the wire trap; there were three sleek brown house rats inside.

  “Good, I’ll use them later, after I’ve looked at the second bottle.”

  He set the bowl aside and cut the seal on the other bottle, the one without the central symbol.

  As soon as the cork was out he felt a powerful surge of energy flow through his fingers. Startled, he managed not to drop the phial as a white mist shot up from the mouth of it and whirled around his head in a windless tempest, caught in the magic circle. It was cool and moist and in it he saw a child’s face, like a shape seen in a cloud. It was a young boy and he looked terrified. Thero also thought he sensed some more familiar magic, but he couldn’t be certain.

  “It’s all right,” Thero whispered, but the face remained drawn with fear and the mist swirled more quickly. “Who are you?”

  Mika.

  Thero blinked in surprise. He didn’t have experience with ghosts or spirits—it wasn’t his area of expertise—and hadn’t really expected an answer.

  “How old are you?”

  Almost nine.

  “Where do you live, Mika?”

  There was a long pause. Yew Lane. The house with the green-and-yellow door. I want my mother!

  “I’ll try to help you.” But he had no idea how—except one. “My name is Thero, and I live at the Orëska House. I want you to come and see me as soon as you can. Will you do that?”

  You’re a wizard? The cloud-image of the face was still there, but some of the fear was gone. The unseeing white eyes were wide.

  “I am, Mika. Please come and see me. Do you promise? You may bring your mother, too, if you like.” How best to coax a frightened child? “I have good things to eat.”

  I promise! Can I go home now?

  “Where are you?”

  I don’t know. I’ve never been here before. Who are those people watching us?

  “You can see this room, and my friends and me?”

  Yes.

  “Amazing,” Thero murmured. “Where were you before you were here?”

  In my street, with my friends.

  “Did someone trade with you? A beggar, perhaps?”

  An old woman. She gave me a dragon tooth for one of the marbles my gran gave me.

  Thero’s lips pressed in a tight humorless smile. It couldn’t be much clearer than that.

  “I’m going to send you home now, Mika. Do you think you can find your way home?”

  Where am I now?

  “You’re in Blue Fish Street.”

  By the Harvest Market?

  “Near there, yes. At an inn called the Stag and Otter. Do you know it?”

  I think so.

  “Good. Remember what we’ve said here, and come and see me.”

  I will. I want to go now!

  The voice was much fainter and the features were beginning to blur. Thero quickly cut the circle with his knife and the mist disappeared, leaving nothing in its wake, not even a mental sensation.

  “What was that all about?” asked Alec.

  Thero found the others regarding him as if he’d just done something rather surprising.

  “You couldn’t hear the—” Spirit? Ghost? Soul? “There was a child in the mist. He spoke to me.”

  “All we heard was you talking to someone named Mika,” Seregil replied. “We couldn’t see you at all. As soon as you opened that bottle you were surrounded by a cloud of thick mist.”

  “Mika was the spirit of the child who owned the marble, wasn’t he?” said Alec.

  Thero nodded, feeling unaccountably sad.

  But Elsbet looked hopeful. “You told him his way home. Do you think he went back to his body?”

  “I hope so. But he could just as easily be dead now. Or perhaps he was dead already and that’s why he was in the bottle. I’m sorry, but it could be any of those.”

  “But he could be alive,” Kari insisted. “This may be our only chance for Illia, if she’s been put into one of those bottles.”

  Thero looked to Seregil. “He said he lives in Yew Lane. Do you know where that is?”

  “Not far from here. It’s a short street, near the Ring wall. And a decent area, too. He’s less likely to have been left to die in some alleyway. Let’s hope his mother heard about the sick ones being moved to the Ring and kept him secret at home.”

  “Good. He said he lives in a house with a green-and-yellow door. Do you think you could find it? I’d like to see what happened to him, if possible.”

  Seregil looked out the window. “It will be dawn soon. You should wait until then, so you don’t scare them to death knocking them up out of bed. In the meantime, I think we should have a look around the Crane. It’s our best chance to find the place empty; no actor will be up this early.”

  “What about the contents of the bottles?” asked Micum.

  Thero cast another spell on the bottle he still held. “The magic is gone from this one, I think.”

  He emptied the contents into the other silver cup. The marble fell to the bottom with a small plink. He sniffed the liquid, but there was nothing of note about it. He dipped the tip of his little finger in it and licked it. Nothing, just plain, stale water. He picked up the marble and got a fleeting impression of a small boy with sandy hair falling across his forehead into his eyes. And there was a hint of something else, something surprising that he thought he recognized.

  “Anything?” asked Alec.

  “A glimpse of what he looks like. I’ll know him if I see him. Now for our
friends the rats.”

  He carefully opened the grate in the top of the trap and set the first cup inside. The rats sniffed it curiously for a moment, then one of them put its paws up on the rim and lapped at the liquid. After the first few drops it fell on its side, shuddering violently.

  “It is poison,” murmured Micum.

  But as they watched the rat calmed and scampered around the confines of the trap, apparently no worse for wear. The other two drank from the cup, but the liquid seemed to have no effect at all on them.

  Thero reached in and picked the first rat up by the tail, then grasped it by the scruff so it couldn’t bite. The same strange magic he’d felt on Atre and Brader emanated from the rat in powerful waves. It was unmistakable.

  “I believe this elixir is meant to be ingested.”

  “But why?” asked Elsbet.

  Thero put the rat back into the trap with the others and looked at the little lock of hair floating in the bowl, then at the marble from the other bottle. “If both bottles held souls of the children who gave him these items, then the one holding Mika, which was without the central symbol, must be made differently, allowing the soul to escape. The symbol on the other may trap the soul in the water.”

  “You mean you just fed the soul of some poor child to a rat?” Elsbet exclaimed in horror.

  “Perhaps,” Thero replied, none too happy at the thought.

  “So Atre and Brader must get some benefit from eating souls,” Seregil said with disgust.

  “The question is, what benefit?” wondered Alec.

  “At this point I don’t give a damn about that, only how to stop him doing the same to Illia!” Micum gritted out. “We have to find the bottle containing Illia’s soul before he—” He broke off and put an arm around Kari as she began to cry.

  Leaving Micum behind to rest—or more likely, fret—Seregil went to the Crane with Thero and Alec. As he’d expected, the theater was deserted. They found their way in through a poorly secured side door but even with the help of Thero’s spell, they found nothing magical inside.

  The welcoming fragrances of bacon and tea greeted them at the inn. Ema was making breakfast, though the house was empty except for them.

  “You should eat,” Thero told the others.

  “I’m not hungry,” Seregil mumbled, continuing on ahead.

  “Well, I am, and the others, too, most likely,” said Alec.

  Ema loaded a tray with rashers of bacon, hot oat cakes, a jar of honey, and a large pot of tea. Thero carried it and followed Alec upstairs.

  Seregil had collapsed into one of the armchairs with his face buried in his hands, heedless for once of how dirty they were. Micum stood gazing into the empty fireplace.

  “Oh, no!” gasped Alec, starting for the bedroom door.

  “No, she’s just the same,” Micum told him.

  Seregil sat back and ran his fingers through his hair. “We’ll search the house tonight while they’re onstage.”

  “And if it’s not there?” asked Thero.

  Seregil snorted. “Then I’ll personally torture Atre until he tells us where it is.”

  “I’ll help you.” Thero poured the tea and handed the cups around.

  “So we burgle Atre’s house tonight,” said Micum.

  “Yes,” Seregil replied. “If we don’t find what we’re looking for, we drive our prey, and pray to Illior that Atre or Brader leads us to the right bottle, and Elani’s things.”

  Micum rested his forehead in his hand. “Why are they doing this?”

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” said Seregil, sipping his tea. “The way that old man and his daughter described seeing the raven woman up in the northlands? She could be a twin for the one we’ve seen. We know from Atre himself that he and Brader are from the north. What if both old women are Atre?”

  “That was thirty years ago,” said Micum. “Atre is a young man.”

  “Consuming the life of another to prolong one’s own,” mused Thero. “The cases I know of have all involved eating the flesh or drinking the blood of a victim. And for the most part, it was just superstition and cannibalism. But if what you suggest is true, then this magic works.”

  “The soul-stealing part certainly does,” said Micum, casting a pained look in the direction of the bedroom.

  Seregil was quiet for a moment, tapping his lip with one long finger, a sure sign that an idea was taking form. “Atre doesn’t always look the same. You haven’t seen enough of him to notice, Micum, but sometimes he looks younger, handsomer than others. I put it down to cosmetics, but maybe that’s the effect of the elixir. At Kylith’s wake Atre was positively glowing. I thought at the time it was odd, given the circumstances.”

  Alec snorted. “He was there to gloat!”

  “Yes. Now, let’s find Mika,” said Seregil, then yawned again.

  “I can guide Thero,” said Micum. “You two should rest while you can.”

  “We have to watch Atre’s house today. None of us have been there. We don’t know what the servant situation is or their daily routine.”

  “I’ll take first watch,” said Alec. “Micum, you can take the next, when you get back. Seregil, get some sleep.”

  As Thero followed Alec and Micum downstairs, he sent up a silent prayer to Illior that the child had survived, and not only for Illia’s sake.

  YEW Street was a small, well-kept lane. People were already out about their morning business, and bread sellers and milk vendors were calling their wares. Dawn was breaking and the clouds overhead were pink against the pale blue of the sky.

  “Mika said a green-and-yellow door,” said Thero, looking around.

  The house in question stood at the far end of the street. It was a tidy little place, with late-summer flowers growing on either side of the stone doorsill. The upper windows were still shuttered, but they could hear a woman sobbing.

  “Oh, Illior!” murmured Micum.

  “We need to know for certain.” Thero went to the door and knocked.

  An instant later the shutters were thrown open overhead and a youngish-looking man in a nightshirt leaned out and gave them a puzzled look. “Who are you?”

  “Are you the father of a boy named Mika?” Thero asked.

  “I am, if that’s anything to you.”

  “Please, sir, if you would, how is the boy?”

  The man broke into a broad grin that belied the sounds of weeping still coming from the room behind him. “He’s awake! But how did you know?”

  “Forgive us for bothering you at such an hour,” said Micum. “This is Lord Thero of the Orëska House. He’s been working with the high priest of Dalna to find a cure for the sleeping death. I think he may have helped your boy tonight.”

  “I must examine him,” Thero told him. “It’s of vital importance to all Rhíminee.”

  The man goggled down at Thero. “Of course, my lord! By the Maker, wait there!” He slammed the shutters closed and a moment later flung the front door open and wrung Thero’s hand with tears in his eyes. “Come in! Oh, my lord, how can I ever repay you?”

  “No need for that. Just take me to the boy.”

  The happy father, who introduced himself as Aman, didn’t appear to be much older than Thero. He led the three of them upstairs to a low-ceilinged bedchamber under the eaves. A plain bedstead covered in bright quilts stood in the center of the room, and beyond it, by the far wall, a young woman knelt on the floor by a little trundle bed, rocking a child in her arms and weeping with what they could now see was joy. The boy looked over her shoulder as they came in, and Thero recognized him at once. It was Mika, sandy-haired and skinny. His eyes, which had been colorless in the mist, were the same clear grey as Seregil’s, Thero saw with an inward thrill.

  “There he is, Mama, the wizard I dreamed of!” Mika cried, struggling out of his mother’s arms and coming to stand before Thero. They stared at each other in silence for a moment, then Mika threw his thin arms around the wizard’s waist. “Thank you, sir, for sendin
g me home!”

  Thero stroked the child’s hair. “You’re very welcome, Mika.” The sense of magic was much stronger. Two hours ago he hadn’t known the boy existed; now he felt a sense of excitement and recognition he’d never experienced before.

  You will know, Nysander’s voice whispered from his memory. Just as I knew with you.

  He gently loosened the boy’s grip on his waist and drew his crystal wand, looking for any residual magics. Behind him, Micum and the parents were talking in low voices.

  Casting the spell, he drew the sigil over Mika and watched as waves of soft pale light cascaded over the boy, then settled like a veil and turned silvery white. He touched his wand’s tip to it and felt a tingle of that same familiar magic go up his arm, but with it a jolt of the foul spell that had captured the boy’s soul. For a fleeting instant he saw Atre’s face. The man was laughing with someone as he raised a phial to his lips and drank.

  Thero suddenly couldn’t breathe. Hastily jerking the wand back, he cast a sign of warding, then dispelled the sigil. The boy would need cleansing.

  Micum hunkered down and held out what appeared to be a cat’s eyetooth. “Mika, you traded with a beggar for this, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, sir,” the child replied politely.

  Thero took it, but as with the yellow crystal, there was nothing magical about it, nor any trace that there ever had been. But he had a clear vision of the dead yellow tom it had come from, and, more faintly, of Atre having handled it. These objects were not the key, just the bait.

  “What did the beggar look like?” he asked.

  “She was an old woman, sir, and though she was dirty, she was very kind. She said that was a baby dragon’s tooth.” He looked at his mother’s tear-streaked face. “Did I do wrong?”

  His mother fell to her knees beside him and clutched him to her breast again. “No, lovey, no! She was an evil woman, this man says.” She looked gratefully up at Micum. “And he says he and his friends are going to catch her and make her stop hurting children like you. What do you say, child?”

  Mika gave them both a solemn little bow. “Thank you, kind sirs.”