Casting Shadows (The Passing of the Techno-Mages #1)

by Jeanne Cavelos

  The question reverberated within that emptiness. He had to fill it. “I am a student. I study—”

  “But tomorrow you are no longer a student. Tomorrow you are initiated. Tomorrow you no longer study life, but live it. Then who are you?”

  “I am a techno-mage.”

  Kell took another step toward him, his body now huge, dwarfing Galen. “A role.”

  “I am Galen.”

  “A name.” Kell came closer, his dissatisfied face filling Galen’s field of vision.

  “I am one who wanted to be a healer and failed.”

  Kell nodded. “And who are you now?” His voice rang through the corridor.

  “I am a seeker.”

  “And what have you found?”

  Galen couldn’t think. “Many things.”

  “What have you found?”

  “I have studied the ways of Wierden.”

  “What have you found?” The question tolled again.

  “I have learned the control of spheres.”

  “What have you found?”

  “I have discovered a progression of spells.”

  “And what have you found?”

  The knowledge fell upon him like a curse. He had found only one thing of import. One thing that now overshadowed all else in his life. “I have found the secret of destruction.”

  “And who has it made you?” Kell’s voice rang. “Who are you?”

  “I am the techno-mage who carries the secret of destruction. The secret that must never be used.”

  Kell’s body paled and dissolved into mist, and Galen looked down to find his body coalescing out of that mist, his hands white, then gaining color, substance. Kell’s voice pealed through the corridor. “Write that across your soul, boy.”

  Galen found himself standing in a large circle with the other apprentices. He knew he had not been asleep, but he did not know how he came to be here. From the expressions of some of the others—Elizar, Razeel, Carvin, Gowen, Fed, Isabelle—he knew they felt the same.

  Their group stood within Elric’s great circle of stones. A band of brilliant moss-green energy connected the stones. Behind each apprentice stood his teacher. Galen recognized Elric’s firm grip on his chrysalis. Galen checked to see if all fifteen apprentices had made it to this moment. They were all there.

  Somehow, he knew the time had come to speak the words of the Code. They spoke together.

  “Solidarity.”

  He closed his eyes and visualized the equation, created the rune that in the language of the Taratimude represented solidarity. The fiery rune blazed in the air before him.

  He sent it into the center of the circle to join the runes of the other apprentices.

  “Secrecy.”

  Again he created the rune, sent it to the center.

  “Mystery.”

  The runes intertwined with one another, creating a tangled ball of energy.

  “Magic.”

  The orange-red light from the runes grew intense. Galen had to squint.

  “Science.”

  The far side of the circle was lost behind a blinding ball of flame. Galen’s heart raced.

  “Knowledge.”

  The beauty of being a mage, of living by the Code, raced through him in a surge of adrenaline. He could want nothing more. Nothing more than to be worthy of them.

  “Good.”

  Though he was perhaps one of only a few to know, his study of the language of the Taratimude had told him there was no rune for good. The rune the mages used to symbolize good actually meant useful. Galen generated the rune, projected it to the center.

  The light was too intense; he had to close his eyes.

  Through his eyelids he saw the tangled ball of light rise overhead. Kell had taken control of it.

  “Dissociate,” Elric said to him.

  Galen visualized the equation that terminated the connection between himself and the chrysalis. The chrysalis echoed the command then went silent. Elric removed it.

  After two days of wearing it, Galen’s body felt incomplete without it, as if a limb or an organ had been removed. Galen squinted his eyes open to watch Elric and the other teachers carry the chrysalises out of the circle. The green band of energy connecting the stones opened a portal for them, closed it behind them.

  And now it was time to be purified by the Code that they had chosen. Again they spoke the words.

  “Solidarity.”

  An umbrella of fire shot out from the ball overhead to envelop them. It rushed down over Galen’s body like living lava, searing him. Galen gasped. Several screamed out. Galen found it had burned away his clothes, his boots. No trace of them remained. He steeled himself.

  “Secrecy.”

  A second umbrella of flame fell upon them. The heat crawled down over him, consuming the hair from his head, his body. He panted.

  “Mystery.”

  The outer layer of his skin was scoured away. Someone released a ragged cry.

  “Magic.”

  Fire raked through his remaining skin, scalded it.

  “Science.”

  Several cried out at once. Galen’s raw flesh quivered.

  “Knowledge.”

  There were no cries now, or perhaps Galen could no longer hear them. He focused on staying upright, on forcing his burning lips to form the final word.

  “Good.”

  The last of the fire fell upon them.

  A portal opened again in the ring of green fire. The apprentices moved toward it, falling into a line. Once through the portal, Galen found himself on a path lined on both sides by mages. The path led to a tent standing separate from the others, a tent he hadn’t seen before. That was where his transformation would take place.

  The interior was dark, and as Galen entered, he found himself somehow alone. No one seemed to be in front of him or behind him. A globe of light appeared farther inside the tent. It hovered over a table of dark crystal.

  In the faint light, Galen noticed that to the side of the entryway were several stacks of canisters. The canisters were smaller than the ones that held the chrysalises, about two feet high and one foot across, and they were covered in an opaque outer layer that was ornate, carved with runes. This must be how the Circle stored the implants, once they made them. Galen marveled that something so intricate and so powerful could be so small.

  Galen approached the table and rested a hand on it. The cold surface stung his raw skin. Obviously he was meant to lie on it. He eased himself down onto the crystal table. As soon as he was supine, a great force—like an invisible hand—slammed down on him. He was pinned flat against the cold surface. His breath came in short gasps. He couldn’t move. His lungs couldn’t fully inflate against the pressure.

  The light above him went out. All was silent except for the panting of his breath. A line of fire cut through the darkness above him, curled itself into the rune for solidarity. The rune descended until it hovered just above him, the same size as his body. The heat of it awakened more pain in his skin. He tried to turn his head to the side to escape from it, but he could not move.

  Then the rune began to unravel. The line of fire whipped out and down, driving into the flesh of his shoulder. Galen screamed.

  Fire burned like a microthin wire shot down his arm. It split into three parts as it reached his hand, running down his thumb, index, and middle fingers and exiting out the tips. The three lines of fire rose and turned back toward him, plunged into the fingertips of his other hand and blazed up his arm, joining and popping out at the shoulder. Galen’s breathing grew harder, faster. The fire ran up into the darkness and vanished.

  He lay in blackness, the line of fire an afterimage above him, anticipating the appearance of the next rune. He didn’t know if he could stand six more of them. He remembered Fed joking nervously, If it were painless, then everyone would want to do it, right? Fed was going through the same thing.

  If Fed could do it, then he could do it.

  As he lay in the dark, thoug
h, something glided over his raw shoulder, faint as a whisper. He started but the jerk of his muscles had no effect against the force holding him down. Something thin and cold and wet pushed into the tiny hole burned by the fire. It wormed inside him, deeper and deeper, generating a dull tingling that spread like goose bumps down his arm. On his shoulder, the length of its body followed into the hole, contracting and relaxing, contracting and relaxing. Its head passed his biceps and continued toward his elbow, drawing a line of coldness with it.

  At the other shoulder a second invader stirred wriggling its way inside. This was not the way it had felt when he’d entered chrysalis stage. One implant had been inserted at the base of his skull. He’d been asleep during the procedure, and he’d awoken only with a vague headache. He’d never had the feeling of something inside him, something other.

  These new implants would connect to that original one, accessing all the information that had been gathered and stored while he trained with the chrysalis. Yet they felt different. These things moving inside him that were not him were wrong. They did not belong.

  At last, as they each split into three and pushed into his fingertips, the movement slowed stopped. His hands and arms tingled infused with the cold. The tech was inside him now, waiting.

  Above him, a line of fire appeared and twisted into the rune for secrecy.

  The pressure holding him down suddenly vanished. Galen’s gasp turned into a huge ragged inhalation. The desire to run was nearly overwhelming, though he felt too weak to move. Were they giving him a chance to leave? Was this another test?

  The rune descended and unraveled, the end of the line of fire raised, poised to strike. Galen realized what was wanted of him. With numb fingers he turned himself onto his stomach. The pressure returned, and with it, the fire.

  The pattern was repeated for each of the seven runes of the Code as Galen watched the lines of fire reflected in the table and panted against its surface. Twin tunnels were burned across the back of his shoulders, one down each side of his spine, and four from the base of his skull up into his brain.

  Each time the formation of the tunnel was followed by the insinuation of the tech, cold, thin, and wet, contracting and relaxing, pushing inside him, stretching the skin of his back, sending prickles like tiny needles down his spine, driving the cold in intricate coils through his brain and settling there, making his body its home.

  He sensed something then, like an echo of an echo of an echo, the faintest hint of what he had felt with the chrysalis. The echo carried his revulsion back to him.

  The pressure lifted, and Galen’s head fell to the side in relief. Numbness spread through his body.

  He was not who he had been. He was not himself anymore. He was something that was part himself and part other.

  He was a techno-mage.

  December 2258

  — chapter 7 —

  Galen sat in his room hunched over his screen. He rocked back and forth, his hand uneasily rubbing his bare head. He had never realized how strange the lack of hair would feel, not only on his head but all over his body. He felt naked, vulnerable. The touch of his robe against his skin was a constant irritant. Perhaps part of it was the residual rawness from the initiation.

  The deepest of his injuries had been healed by the Circle following the implantation of the tech. The remainder were healing quickly with the help of the organelles that were now being produced within him by the tech. The hair, it was said, would begin to grow back after a few more days. He planned to scour it regularly from his scalp as a sign of the initiation he had undergone and the Code that it embodied. Yet he would be glad to have the hair on the rest of his body restored.

  Even then, though, he feared he would not feel as he had before. His body had become foreign to him since the initiation. He had thought the implants would only be involved in the casting of spells. Yet every task—breathing, walking, chewing—had been altered in some way he couldn’t describe. His body felt as if it had been changed and an agitating undercurrent of energy churned deep inside him. It was disorienting, unsettling. Although he was fit, he had not yet left the house. He didn’t feel in control. He knew his system was adapting, but he was uncomfortable with the process, uncomfortable with the sensations he remembered from the initiation, the tech invading him, burrowing deep into his body.

  The invasion reminded him of the stab of Jab’s needle-sharp sting, releasing its eggs and the virus accompanying them. Now, as he imagined it, the virus was multiplying, infecting him, and the eggs had begun to hatch, releasing wriggling larvae that raced through his system.

  Galen looked at the canister on his worktable. The chrysalis floated within, silver with hints of yellow. It seemed, more than anything else, to be waiting. The chrysalis had become attuned to his system. It would now serve as his source of external tech, connecting his body to various other systems built from lesser technology, such as a ship, a place of power, a staff. It was as if an organ had been removed from his body, yet the connection remained. Wherever it was, he would be too.

  And something new had been inserted into his body. From the data stored in the old implant at the base of his skull, the tech knew his body systems, his thoughts, his spell language. It was growing, intertwining itself with his systems, combining itself with him, making itself part of him. The tech couldn’t be taken off and stored in a jar. It wasn’t something he would access only while safely under Elric’s supervision. It was with him now and for the rest of his life, ready to respond to any command he might give at any moment. Elric had spoken to him of this, but Galen hadn’t truly understood until now.

  He retrieved a small square mirror from his shelf, lowered his robe from one shoulder. As the tech developed, discolorations would appear along his shoulder blades and spine, where the tech came nearest the surface of his skin. Galen had seen Elric’s; they formed an intricate brown, stippled pattern that looked like nothing more than an elaborate tattoo. Galen held the mirror behind him, twisting his neck to catch sight of his spine. The discoloration was faint, but an elaborate pattern had already formed. He tilted the mirror, finding that the pattern ran the entire length of his spine.

  He had cast no spells since receiving the tech. He told himself he had no need, but the truth was he felt reluctant to rouse it.

  Oddly, Elric had not pushed him to use the tech or to return to the convocation. If Galen didn’t know better, he would think Elric had given up on teaching him. Galen had been afraid—after his attack on Elizar—that his relationship with Elric had been ruined. Although the Circle had given him another chance, Galen knew he had disappointed Elric deeply. He hadn’t known whether Elric might still find him worthy of teaching, or worthy of care.

  Yet Elric had overseen his recovery as if nothing had changed. Late each night, after satisfying the demands of the convocation, Elric drove him relentlessly through hours of mind-focusing exercises designed to sharpen his mental discipline and control.

  During the day, Elric surprised him with tests, checking his ability to control his impulses in various disconcerting ways, such as by throwing objects at him—some illusory, some not—and seeing how he would react. The rigorous training brought Galen a great sense of reassurance. Elric still wanted to teach him. Elric was giving him another chance. Galen was determined not to disappoint him again.

  To prove himself worthy of this second chance, he must never use the spell of destruction again. After conjuring it in the training hall, Galen had never imagined that he would. He had thought common sense would prevent him from doing anything so foolish. Yet common sense didn’t operate in a fraction of a second. Only instinct.

  Galen had thought the spell was unrelated to him, that it had been derived through objective logic. Yet what Kell had said was true, and Galen could not hide from it, much as he might want. His thoughts ran in narrow, regimented pathways. His methodical spell language reflected those pathways, reflected him. The spell derived from that spell language reflected him. And his use o
f the spell had finally, revealed who he was. Someone who would attack a friend. Someone who would strike with overwhelming force. Someone whose first, most basic instinct was to kill.

  The restless energy of the tech churned inside him. Galen returned to his worktable and his screen and tried to ignore it, to work on translating some new spells. But the agitating undercurrent would not allow him to concentrate. The tech was growing.

  After a few moments, he became aware that Fa was peeking into his window. He felt relieved at the distraction. Keeping his eyes on the screen, he snuck a hand under the table, into the tiny sack he kept fastened there, and took out a small bauble. “Do you know what happens to someone who stands outside a techno-mage’s window?”

  “She gets invited in.”

  Galen turned and gave her a reassuring nod. She remained outside, her thick fingers clenched on the windowsill. This was the first time he’d seen her since his attack on Elizar. She was still frightened of him. Yet at least she’d come.

  He walked to the window and crouched in the sunlight. With every motion, his body felt strange, no longer his own. “What do you have there?” He reached behind her ear, produced the bauble.

  “Oh!”

  “That’s pretty,” he said, as if seeing it for the first time. He handed it to her.

  She stared at his bald head, and he saw a tightness in her face, a dismay, that he’d never seen before.

  “That man—Elizar—who was burned,” Galen said. “He’s going to be all right. I wish I hadn’t hurt him. I told him I was sorry.”

  Fa looked down, nodded. It struck Galen that he should have visited Elizar before now. When they’d last had a chance to talk, Galen had been certain he was going to be cast away. Now that he was not, Galen thought he should make sure the rift between them was healed. He would like to have his friend back, and if there truly was some threat to the mages, perhaps Elizar would confide in him. Perhaps Galen could help.

  First, though, he had to repair his relationship with Fa. The corner of a book bound in tak hide stuck out of the large pocket on the front of her orange jumper. “Shall we read your book?” he asked.