Seven Sorcerers: Book Three of the Books of the Shaper

by John R. Fultz

  The summit of the white mountain rose high above the ridges of the valley. Sunlight struck prismatic auras from its flawless skin. A great arch appeared in the western side of the edifice. Zyung emerged from this arch, leaving the hollow heart of the embryonic citadel. The Seraphim lingered about the pale immensity they had erected. The foundations of the new Holy Mountain completely smothered the grounds where Shar Dni had once spread its streets and gardens.

  Zyung looked toward the top of the structure, which grew angular and flattened itself out at the zenith. Twelve snow-white towers sprouted sleek and graceful from its base. The Almighty spread his arms and ascended to float level with the summit. The symphony of sorcery reached its climax and fell into silence. The ring of High Seraphim paused and descended to the earth about the circumference of their creation.

  Twin rays of starfire poured from Zyung’s eyes, washing across the western face of his temple-palace. When the light faded, the white stone had reshaped itself into a perfect likeness of his face. The deep sockets of the stone eyes burned with inextinguishable fires.

  The mountain’s interior halls and chambers would be carved and sculpted to perfection over the next few days by the Lesser Seraphim under Lavanyia’s charge. They would plant gardens and orchards, growing them swiftly with clever earth-magic. The beauty of this new Holy Mountain would eventually rival or exceed that of the original in the Celestial City.

  Yet none of these Lesser Ones knew that the first Holy Mountain would soon crumble beneath the wrath of the unleashed Old Breed. Sungui’s skin tingled in contemplation of such delicious blasphemy.

  Now a mighty roar shook the valley–the cheering of the Manslayer legions upon the hills and the armada beyond the shore. This new Holy Mountain was not only the heart of Zyung’s Extended Empire. It was a testament to his peoples’ victory over their foes. A tribute to their loyalty and bravery. A memorial to all those who had given their lives to make it possible. Within its gleaming substance lay the bones of their brothers along with those of their enemies.

  Sungui pondered the symbolism of this blending of bones. It evoked the Living Empire itself, which blended all cultures and nations into one monolithic shape.

  It was tyranny and oppression given form, a monument to Zyung’s dominance.

  Perhaps I will carve my own face on a mountain someday.

  Someday soon.

  14

  The Gates of Uurz

  The dream is one with the revolving world itself. We are currents of air gliding across stone and carving ancient patterns into the rock. We are the rock itself, born of heat and slowed to form and weight and density by time and forces unseen. We are the ocean and its waves, the storms tearing trees from the soil and the grass sprouting from mounds of black earth. We are the deep gorges and ice-crowned peaks, the parched and steaming deserts, the verdant fruits ripe with sunlight, the moldering bones of graveyards, and the living blood that courses through living things.

  There is only the dream, which encircles and gives birth to the dreamer. We are motes in the great field of consciousness that is everywhere, all at once, rising and subsiding in an endless dance of creation and destruction. We are made from the light of stars and spread by the gusts of eternity.

  Time and space are fleeting concepts in the greater dream, and we are their reflections, staring back at ourselves, often without recognizing our true nature.

  We are patterns, like everything born of the great world-dream, spinning, churning, producing further patterns. Patterns within patterns.

  This is wisdom. It is the light of the dream we inhabit.

  This is peace. There are no distinctions here between what is and what has been and what will be. This is the All, and it is the center of existence.

  And yet…

  A glimmer of something separate intrudes on this panorama of boundless unity.

  This is memory.

  It floods into us like warm blood, pouring from a wound in the substance of the living world. Black talons rip at the dream, shredding it like supple flesh, bleeding awareness into our communal soul. Suddenly we remember…

  I remember.

  We are not one soul, but four.

  This dream is not ours after all. It belongs to Udgrond. Its patterns spin across infinity, but we lose sight of them as we sink into those that are most familiar to us.

  This is now.

  Yes, we have awakened from Udgrond’s world-dream. Is it time?

  The leaden weight of urgency falls upon me like the blow of a great hammer. How long has it been? Udgrond drew us into his dream and kept us there. But for how long?

  My eyes open. I see a network of cracks and fissures like translucent veins. The crystalline quartz of our prison shatters. The great pillar in which Udgrond trapped our spirit-selves falls to pieces as our souls leave his world-dream. A fleeting vision of oneness, the dream has already left our minds.

  “Iardu…”

  A voice calls my name, confirming my identity. Below us the physical shards of our broken prison explode against the cavern floor. The orange flames of deep-earth fires leap from chasms in the darkness. The titan of condensed magma reclines still on his throne. His size dwarfs our floating spirits. Udgrond’s flesh has darkened, yet it has not completely cooled. Red veins of molten silver gleam across his chest and limbs. His eyes are closed and dark.

  How long have we slept?

  “Iardu! Awaken, you fool!”

  A specter of red-black flame hovers before me. At first I do not recognize it. I turn instead to the three spirits who were entrapped with me. Sharadza blinks at me like a drowsy ghost. Alua’s spirit-self is a figure sculpted of white flame. Vaazhia’s forked tongue darts in and out of her mouth as she raises ethereal claws. She already knows who has freed us. I sense the mingled fury and fear that radiates from the lizardess.

  Now I see clearly the pale face at the heart of the ebony and ruby flames. White as bone, and cruel in its loveliness. Eyes that resemble black diamonds in the physical world seem more like empty voids in this ghostly state.

  “Ianthe.” I speak her name with suspicion. She is my enemy.

  “Who else could have freed you from this fool’s fate?” Ianthe asks. Her void-eyes examine my three spirit companions. I recall our physical selves locked inside my sanctum in the world far above. Through the formless current that connects me to my living body, I sense that it still lives. Therefore, it is likely that my companions’ bodies are unharmed as well.

  Now Sharadza recognizes the presence of the Claw. “You?” There is horror in her soundless voice. “Blood-drinking monster! Slayer of innocents! You will never reclaim me.”

  Ianthe laughs. “Nor would I wish to, Daughter of Vod. You are less than nothing to me. I come for the Shaper.”

  Vaazhia hisses.

  Alua forms a globe of white spirit-flame and holds it in her fist like a dagger. The wife of Vireon knows she cannot harm Ianthe in this form, or there would be no stopping her from the attempt. There must be a final confrontation between these two, and it will be terrible. Yet it cannot be here in this forsaken place below the world.

  “You freed us from the dream of Udgrond.” I say it to remind Alua of this fact, and because I hardly believe it myself. I do not trust this deliverance, yet I must accept it.

  “If I had not done so, you would have lingered here for a thousand years,” Ianthe says. “You always were a Prince of Fools, but this is your saddest folly.”

  Ianthe’s words should not sting me, but they do. She is right. I should never have come here seeking to wake Udgrond from his long dream. It was a grievous error born of desperation. This one mistake could have meant the end of everything that I worked long ages to build.

  “You have my gratitude,” I tell her, “if not my love.”

  “I had that long ago,” she says. “You forgot the pleasures we shared when you forgot your true self.”

  “Say rather when I discovered my true self, Claw.”

&nbs
p; Her smile is beautiful and wicked.

  “I do not understand,” Sharadza says, hovering near to me. “This creature is the enemy of us all. Why has she aided us?”

  Alua’s flaming spirit erupts. It rushes toward Ianthe’s ghost-self. “Twice you have murdered me,” Alua says. “I remember now.”

  “No, Alua,” I warn her. “Today is not the day to pursue the vengeance rightly owed to you. We are weak in this place, and too far from our physical selves. Ianthe is our enemy, yes, but she has saved us.”

  “Why?” Vaazhia spits like a cobra. If she were inside her body, it would be venom rather than mere words. “Why rescue your enemies, Bitch of Khyrei? We will not serve you. Rather put us back in the titan’s prison than ask it.”

  Ianthe’s empty eyes focus on Vaazhia’s coiled spirit-self. “We have no time for this, Lizard-Queen,” says the Claw. “You are not in my debt, nor would I ever accept your service. I can see that you serve only Iardu. Has he bedded you to earn your allegiance?”

  Vaazhia writhes and hisses. I calm her as best I can. A caress of my astral hand pulls her back. I move between the souls of the three women and that of the Claw.

  “Enough!” I say. “How long have we slept?”

  “I know not when you first stumbled into this trap like a brace of stupid hares,” says Ianthe. “My far sight found you down here four days after the taking of the Sharrian valley. A mighty slaughter it was. Your Giant-King fell to the blade of Zyung, and your northern legions were decimated. Three days from now the God-King moves his Holy Armada to take Uurz.”

  Sharadza cries out when Ianthe mentions the fall of Vireon. She longs to ask if her brother still lives, but she will not lower herself to ask this of the Claw.

  “You should have been there, Shaper,” says Ianthe. She grins, enjoying the pain her words bring. “Yet you were held fast in the dream of Udgrond while your body lay at rest. You slept while thousands of your people died. You abandoned them.”

  “Stop it!” She has raised my ire. She has known how to do this since the world was a cooling mass of stellar gasses. “Do not tell me of my own failings! They will haunt me enough without your gloating. You say we have three days until Zyung sails for Uurz.”

  “In the evening of that same day his dreadnoughts will reach the green-gold city,” she says. “This time you must be there to face him, along with any of the Old Breed who will stand with you. There are a thousand of our kind who serve Zyung, although they are Diminished in his presence. I have freed you from Udgrond only so that you may stop the advance of Zyung. Never forget that I have done so.”

  “Do you then stand with us?” I ask. It cannot be so easy.

  “No,” she said. “I sail with Zyung. Yet you already know this.”

  “You hide your treachery well.” Suddenly it becomes plain to me why Ianthe has rescued us. We must rise and reclaim our bodies now. There will be no aid from Udgrond.

  “You have three days, Shaper,” Ianthe says. Distant stars blink in the abyss of her eyes. “I could have entered your citadel and destroyed your bodies. I did not. Remember this too.”

  The red-black flame rises into the raw stone of the cavern roof.

  “Come,” I say. “We must arise.” I steal a last look at Udgrond slumbering on his throne.

  Our spirit-selves rush upward far faster than they descended. Thousands of leagues of magma, rock, and glittering earth-crust flash by us like a torrent of waters. Yet it is our souls that move, not the substances about us. The rush of ascension is dizzying. At its end the world of flesh and blood claims us as the earth claims a falling star. Yet we have fallen upward, and the star is our united immortal essence.

  Our bond fades, and our bodies reclaim their spirits.

  Again my eyes open, and this time they are actual eyes. Groggy and unsteady on our feet, we rise up to stand about the circle of power. With a word of dismissal I break the spell, plucking the Flame of Intellect from the circle and restoring it to my chest. Our bodies are sore and stiff after long days of lying inert. Our bellies are empty and growling. A great thirst strikes me like a shot arrow.

  “We must refresh ourselves,” I say, “then travel at once to Uurz.”

  When the spirit chamber’s doors open, Eyeni greets me by rubbing her cheek against my thigh. “You slept too long, Father,” she says. “I was worried.” She lopes beside me as we walk the corridor to my dining hall. Her tiny wings flutter upon the glossy fur of her back.

  “I am unharmed, child,” I reassure her, stroking her hair. I do not mention that Ianthe’s spirit-self somehow eluded my guardian’s astral vigilance and followed us into the titan’s domain. If Eyeni had stopped her, we would still be lost in his long dream. Or Ianthe would have slain Eyeni to reach me. There are some powers that cannot be prevented from going where they wish to go. I recall Ianthe’s condemnation of my own foolishness and mentally chastise myself. I cannot afford to make such a mistake again.

  Thousands upon thousands have died already, and we are out of time.

  My guests gather about the banquet table beneath the tapestries of fallen kingdoms. Invisible attendants bring us a meal of fruit, cheese, fresh bread, and roasted lobster. I drink deep of the wine, a heady Yaskathan vintage, and stuff my empty belly until it is full. Sharadza, Alua, and Vaazhia break their fasts as well, pausing only to ask questions of me. Sharadza eats hardly at all; concern for her brother outweighs even her deep hunger.

  Outside the high windows sunlight gleams across the green ocean. The tittering of monkeys in the courtyard mingles with the joyous songs of birds. These favorite sounds revive my spirit as the food and drink enliven my body.

  Sharadza speaks first. I already know the worry that darkens her emerald eyes. “Ianthe said that Vireon was dead. Is it true?” She looks at me as a child looks to its father for truth.

  “We will know soon,” I tell her. “The Claw mixes lies with truth. Nor does she know all. Before the sun sets, Alua’s magic will carry us to Uurz most swiftly.”

  “Vireon is my husband,” says Alua, as if remembering this for the first time. Sharadza clutches her hand. There is concern but no sadness in Alua’s eyes. I think that she still does not recall her love for the Vodson, although she remembers the man himself. When she sees Vireon in the flesh, that will be the test. And if he is truly dead, then it will be better for Alua that she does not remember too much.

  “Why did the bitch truly aid us?” Vaazhia asks. She drinks wine and eats lobster, but has no taste for the other foods. I should have called for red meat to suit her tastes. But there is little time for such indulgence.

  “Ianthe seeks to use us,” I say. “As she is using Zyung.”

  “To what end?” says Sharadza. She knows Ianthe’s cruelty firsthand. It has left a scar upon her soul that will never be completely healed.

  “She wishes to pit me and my allies against the God-King, hoping that we will defeat him.”

  “Why does she not rise against him herself?” asks Sharadza. “She is of the Old Breed, and no doubt Gammir will obey her.”

  “Because she fears Zyung,” I say. “As great as Ianthe’s power is, it is no match for that of Zyung. She must have fled into his service when we defeated her at Khyrei, and taken the bastard with her. These two cannot hope to stand against the God-King and his thousand High Seraphim. A legion of Old Breed has been chained to Zyung’s will, as we were chained to the dream of Udgrond for a while. Yet Zyung’s long dream is an earthly force, a grand theory put into practice, a dogma of absolute order. The longer Ianthe serves him, the more she is Diminished by his will, as these others have been.”

  “She would have us rid her of Zyung,” says Alua.

  “She will break Zyung’s hold on her only if we cast him down,” says Vaazhia.

  “And she will claim his empire for her own,” I say. “She will become him.”

  “Does she put so much faith in us?” Sharadza asks. “Can we defeat this God-King?”

  There is quiet ab
out the table.

  “We must try,” I say. “Perhaps Ianthe will aid us when the time is right. I sense that Khama still lives as well. He lies recovering in Uurz even now, with the rest of the survivors.”

  “Can you not sense Vireon?” Sharadza pleads.

  “Vireon carries the blood of the Old Breed, but he is not one of them,” I explain. “My bond with Khama is strong. I would sense his death from any distance. As for Vireon, and the rest of the Kings, we must go to them now.”

  I stand and ask Alua to work her spell. The power swells deep inside her. Vaazhia, too, seethes with restrained energies. Our return to the sunlit world has awakened her lust for life. We do not have Udgrond, but I am glad for the presence of the lizardess.

  Alua spins her white flame about us and we rise, gliding through an open window. The gray-white citadel grows small beneath us. The ocean glimmers in all directions. Alua turns her eyes toward the distant coastline, and her comet streaks across the blue sky.

  Sharadza’s hand slips into my own. I hold it tighter than I should. In her worried state, she does not seem to mind. If my tragic error has caused the death of her brother, I will never forgive myself.

  Hand in hand, we hurtle toward the Stormlands.

  The City of Wine and Song prepared for a siege. The folk of a hundred surrounding villages streamed along the Eastern and Western Roads toward the gates of Uurz. Many led entire herds of sheep, goats, or pigs, hoping to find refuge as well as profit behind the city’s walls.

  From inside Alua’s rushing flame we watched the men, women, and children of the Stormlands converge on the city. The gates would remain open until Uurz had swelled to the point of saturation; those left outside would have to fend for themselves when the Hordes of Zyung came. Very few common folk knew that the sturdy walls of the city would mean nothing to an enemy who could sail above them on currents of wind.

  The skies above the Stormlands were cloudy yet calm when we crossed them. If they had been raging with storms or blackened by thunderheads, I would be assured of Vireon’s health. Like his father before him, the weather often reflected his temperament. It was Vod who turned black desert to green plain, loosing rivers from the earth and rains from the sky. Vireon held this legacy and more of Vod’s magic in his blood. Lately he had discovered this fact and embraced it. Yet he had not learned the full depth of his power. If he still lived, I would show it to him.