HONOR BOUND (The Spare Heir)

by Southwick, Michael G.

  Other than Pentrothe, Zensa was the only adult who actually listened to his questions, and she always gave him serious answers. She didn’t act like the women in the palace. She never flirted, nor did she gossip, and she treated the King like an errant boy. Jorem had once seen her nose to nose with a palace guard, none to gently informing him of the consequences should she ever see him again. Another time Jorem saw her ever so gently scoop up a stricken spider and carry it out of the palace.

  Zensa’s visits were rare, perhaps once or twice a year. She seldom stayed for more than a day, so Jorem considered it a treat when she came. She had always treated Jorem like an adult, even when he’d first met her and he had only been six years old. Having her for a friend was very important to Jorem so he did his best to act like an adult. That was usually easy to do except perhaps on those rare times that she didn’t have time for him.

  When Jorem reached Pentrothe’s chambers he found Lady Zensa and Pentrothe sitting at the worktable deep in discussion. Not wanting to disturb what appeared to be a very intense subject, Jorem quietly took a seat at the edge of the room. Pentrothe glanced at him and gave a slight nod of his head letting Jorem know that it was all right for him to be there. As Jorem had gotten older he was permitted to listen and occasionally participate in more of the discussions between the Wizard and the Dragon Mage.

  When Zensa spoke, though her voice was soft and clear, it was filled with concern.

  “Pentrothe, it’s been nearly five years since any have seen him. Of his bonded servants only five of us remain. I can still sense him but I cannot find him. The channel between us is still there but it is blocked by a force the likes of which I have never seen.”

  “Only five of you left?” asked Pentrothe. “What became of the others?”

  “Most vanished without a trace,” replied Zensa. “Only two have been found before their bodies decayed beyond recognition. There was no sign of attack, physical or magical. They just ceased to live. Orglen even tried calling back their shades to no avail.”

  “Orglen is among the best at conversing with spirits. I find it difficult to believe he was unable to trace them,” Pentrothe murmured as he stroked his gray beard.

  Zensa sighed. “He once boasted that he could trace the shade of a fossilized shellfish. He said there was more to trace in a rock than in the two we found.”

  “Were there any marks on the bodies?” Pentrothe asked. His hand stilled upon his beard and his eyes stared at the ceiling.

  Zensa looked at Pentrothe with such intensity that her green eyes nearly glowed. “Not so much as a scratch. What are you thinking? Have you seen something like this before?”

  Pentrothe got to his feet and walked to a set of shelves. “Jorem, I shall require your assistance.” Reaching up he pulled down a clear glass jar and held it out to Jorem. “I will need a moth or a fly. Check the window, I’m sure you will find something there. To sever the link between any creature and its soul so completely that a mage of Orglen’s ability cannot find one from the other would require a very powerful magic.”

  “You think there is a powerful mage out there attacking the servants of Echalain?” Zensa asked. “That doesn’t make any sense. A battle between powerful mages would, at the very least, leave signs on the landscape at the scene of the battle.”

  “I didn’t say a powerful mage. I said a powerful magic. An old magic,” Pentrothe said as he walked across the room. “There is a spell known to only a few that requires very little magic to be set in place. I came upon it many years ago and spent some time unraveling its nature.”

  Rummaging through a cabinet, Pentrothe reached in and withdrew a wooden box. There was nothing about the box that would draw ones attention. It was plain and flat on all sides. The wood was stained with age as though it had been made centuries ago. It could very well have been a solid block of wood as there was no sign of hinges or a seam.

  Placing the box on the worktable, Pentrothe began moving his hands over the box while murmuring odd musical sounds and occasionally touching various spots on the box. Jorem felt a tingling sensation along his spine. Whenever Pentrothe used real magic Jorem could feel it this way. The stronger the magic the more intense the feeling became. Pentrothe had said it had something to do with sensitivity to conduits or some such thing. Only when Pentrothe used what he called fake magic, like flash-powder or smoke capsules, was Jorem unable to detect it.

  Pentrothe placed his hand on top of the box and gently slid the top surface off. Reaching into the box he withdrew a velvety black pouch. Loosening the strings of the pouch, he poured its contents onto the table. Five stones of various sizes and shapes, each a different color, tumbled out of the pouch.

  One by one the wizard moved the stones until they formed a square with one stone at the center. Pentrothe held his hand above the center stone and began the musical chant again. When he touched the center stone it began to glow. Gently he slid one of the corner stones toward the center stone until it touched. When the corner stone began to glow, Pentrothe moved it back to its position in the square. He repeated the process with each of the corner stones until all of the stones glowed softly on the table. Pentrothe gave a sharp whistle, clapped his hands together and the stones went dark.

  “That is all that is needed for the spell to work. So long as the four outer stones are not disturbed the trap will remain intact. As you can see, there is no outward sign that it exists. Were you able to feel the magical energies Jorem?”

  The tingling feeling had stopped at the same moment that the stones had gone dark. “Yes sir, a bit more than when you light a candle, but it’s gone now.” Jorem stepped forward and placed the glass jar on the table. A large moth fluttered about inside the jar, occasionally bumping into the sides.

  “You can feel when someone is altering the flow of magic?” Zensa asked, looking at Jorem.

  “Indeed he can!” replied Pentrothe. “And the extent to which it is altered.”

  “Is this true?” she asked, her emerald eyes seeming to pin Jorem in place.

  “Yes ma’am. The bigger the spell is the more I can feel it. It feels a bit like when you’ve sat in one place for to long and your legs start to tingle like pins and needles.”

  “I thought you said he has no magical abilities,” Zensa said, glancing at Pentrothe.

  “Not even a trace. He has an unusual resistance to magic being used on him, almost a shielding, but nothing he controls. I’ve never seen anyone that could sense magic and not use it. I thought perhaps in your travels you might have seen something like this.”

  “Interesting.” Her eyes took on a faraway look. “I’ve heard of this type of thing before, but never in a human. Just in. Do his brothers share this ability?” she asked Pentrothe.

  “No,” Pentrothe replied dismissively. “You could conjure a demon under the other four and they wouldn’t notice.”

  “One in five and a grandchild of King Grendith. Very interesting indeed.”

  Zensa smiled at Jorem and he felt as thought he had been dipped in warm water. The light from the window gleamed off her raven hair. Her golden skin seemed to exude warmth into the room. No wonder the guardsmen all wanted to be her escort when she came to visit Pentrothe. They always treated her with utmost deference. Their respect was probably due to a guard that had tried to get too friendly. They had buried his armor in place of his body. Jorem had asked her about the incident once and he still remembered her response: “Always remember, to a dragon, you’re just a tasty little snack!”

  “I’ve seen wards similar to these,” Zensa said as she looked down at the stones. “They are generally used to shield a room. I use them when I’m involved with a delicate spell and can’t afford to be disturbed. There are mages who use wards to contain imps, demons and the like, but the wards have to be activated before the demon is conjured into the room. I don’t see how they could be used to trap a mage. Activated wards are like a bonfire in a dark room for anyone who can sense magic. Inactive wards li
ke these are little more than pretty rocks.”

  “Patience, my dear,” said Pentrothe. “Normally the center stone is the ethereal shield, but in this case it is a trigger. The final piece of the puzzle is the key that makes it all work.”

  Reaching into the box the wizard withdrew a small crystal globe and placed it on the table. Undulating ribbons of a smoke-like substance swirled inside the globe, twisting and turning like a living thing. With a sharp intake of breath, Zensa stepped back from the table. Her eyes were wide with fear and her arms came up as if to defend against a physical attack.

  “The Forbidden,” she hissed and glared at Pentrothe. “How did you come to possess this evil abomination? If it were any but me your life would be forfeit.”

  “Call it youthful curiosity and a penchant for looking into locked rooms. I found it in a secret library in the lower levels of Dawnsword Keep. Once I discovered what it was I dared not admit to having it,” admitted Pentrothe.

  “When were you last at Dawnsword?” Zensa asked, still glaring at the wizard.

  “The day you were chosen as a Dragon Mage,” Pentrothe replied as innocently as possible.

  “You’ve had this… this thing for all of this time?”

  If it had been anyone else, they would have withered under the fierceness of Zensa’s glare. Pentrothe merely smiled.

  “If you recall,” said Pentrothe, “many of my youthful decisions were rash and often lacked forethought.”

  With a shake of her head, Zensa did her best to compose herself. Although her face appeared calm and serene, Jorem could see that anger still glinted in her eyes. That she must be well over sixty years of age was difficult for Jorem to believe of the youthful, vibrant woman. Perhaps this was one of the advantages of serving a dragon.

  “You should have destroyed it the moment you knew what it was,” she said flatly.

  “Perhaps, but from what I have learned, it would require more magic than I control to destroy this device.”

  “It must be returned to Dawnsword!” Zensa insisted. That she expected Pentrothe to argue was obvious. “The Forbidden was taken from the land of man many thousands of years ago. Few of the dragon mages know that these abominations still exist. If Echalain or any of his kind should find you with this your life would end.”

  Pentrothe bowed his head and nodded much like a child being reprimanded by its mother. “I am an old man. Death no longer holds me in fear as it once did. If my suspicions are correct another has learned of what you call the Forbidden and is using it to gain power. Come, let us get on with this and see what we can learn. The more we know about how it works the better we can defend against it. When we are done you can take it back to its hiding place.”

  Taking the center stone from the table Pentrothe touched it to the very top of the globe. The smoky ribbons inside the globe dispersed into a fog that filled the inside of the globe like a blanket. The wizard replaced the center stone back in its position with the other stones. He then positioned the jar with its captive moth on the table so that the side of the jar was touching the center stone. The moth continued to flutter about the inside of the jar vainly attempting to escape.

  “There is no effect on an average creature. The trigger will not activate unless there is magic present. Now let us add a bit of magic and see what happens. Zensa, would you care to do this?”

  Zensa shook her head. “I’ll have nothing of me connected to that thing!”

  “Very well,” Pentrothe sighed.

  Taking the jar in his hand, Pentrothe pointed at the moth and squinted his eyes in concentration. After a moment, a small dot of light appeared on one of the wings of the moth. Then he carefully set the jar back beside the center stone.

  The moth fluttered about the jar until it flew near the center stone. As it passed by the center stone it dropped to the bottom of the jar. The light was gone from the moth’s wing and it seemed to stagger as it wandered aimlessly in the jar. In a short time the moth ceased to move. At the very moment that the moth ceased to move, Jorem felt as though a giant hand had closed about his entire body, lifted him from the floor and thrown him across the room. His skin felt as though it were on fire and then everything went dark.

  Chapter IV

  When Jorem came to, everything looked hazy. As the haziness cleared all he could see were emerald green eyes. He felt a cooling touch on his chest and forehead. A soft, soothing voice was echoing in his mind. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The air smelled of forest, wind and rain.

  Although his eyes were closed Jorem could see a bright light before him that was so dazzling it was almost like looking at the sun. Then he noticed bits of green light flickering out from the brighter light. The bits of green light seemed to drift toward him and were absorbed at the cool spots on his chest and head. Then the cooling touches were gone and the flecks of green light diminished.

  Startled, Jorem opened his eyes again and found Zensa kneeling at his side and Pentrothe standing beside her. “What happened?” he asked.

  “That is precisely what we were going to ask you,” said Pentrothe with concern in his voice.

  “I’m not sure,” said Jorem. “I was watching the moth when something threw me across the room. It felt like my entire body was on fire. I guess I must have passed out. Where did the light go?”

  “Light?” What light is that?” asked Zensa.

  “Just a moment ago there was a bright light in here.”

  A concerned look crossed Zensa’s face. “I did not sense any injury, but perhaps you struck your head when you fell.” Reaching out she placed her hand on Jorem’s forehead. Her hand was soft and cool on his skin. Jorem closed his eyes and Zensa seemed to incandesce before him. Jorem opened his eyes and the light vanished. In its place was Zensa, her hand gently resting on his forehead. He experimented a few times, closing and opening his eyes until he was sure.

  “It’s you,” Jorem said. “Somehow when I close my eyes I can still see you, but you’re all light.”

  Pentrothe chuckled. “So now you are the lady of light, eh?” The teasing in his voice was obvious. “When next I see Echalain I’ll have to share this with him.”

  Zensa glared at Pentrothe with her lips pursed. “Pen, II’ll pin you to a wall and shave off that precious beard if you even mention!”

  “Ah Zen,” Pentrothe interrupted, “’tis but a jest. Look here, you sit between the boy and the window. It’s just a trick of the light in his eyes. Come now Jorem, are you all right?”

  “Yes sir, I’m fine,” Jorem replied. In truth he was not at all confident in his actual condition, nor in Pentrothe’s explanation of the light. Just to be sure he closed his eyes and turned his head toward Zensa as she walked back to the table. Nothing. Not so much as a spark, just the inside of his eyelids. Jorem shook his head, wished he hadn’t, got up off of the floor and joined the others at the table.

  “There, you see, it worked,” proclaimed Pentrothe pointing at the crystal globe.

  The globe was no longer filled with smoke. Instead it appeared to be empty. Then Jorem noticed a light wispy form fluttering about inside the globe. Leaning closer to the globe, Jorem could see the vague outline of the moth’s wings on the wispy form. Glancing back to the jar the moth still lay on the bottom, unmoving.

  “Sir,” Jorem said, “I don’t understand. What is it that flutters inside the globe?”

  “Evil. The entire thing is evil!” hissed Zensa.

  “Now, now Zen, that’s not true and you know it,” replied Pentrothe. “Jorem, there is more to every living thing than flesh and bone. Priests call it a soul. Mages call it essence. In either case it is what is left after the physical body is gone. This contraption, the Forbidden, as Zensa calls it, combined with the wards can actually pull a being’s essence out of their body and trap it inside the globe.”

  “Can you put it back?” asked Jorem.

  “Released from the globe the essence will attempt to return to the body from which it came. Th
e wards will protect the body from damage for a time. How long the body is preserved depends on the amount of magic the wards draw from whatever falls in the trap. For a high level mage it could be as long as a week. Then of course there is the distortion factor. The longer the essence is separated from the body, the more difficult it is for it to find its way back. Distance can also make it difficult for the essence to return. The globe can be hundreds, even thousands of leagues away from the wards, and still work it’s magic.”

  “Must everything you say become a lecture?” Zensa said more than asked. “I cannot think with this thing in here. Would you please put in back in its box before I am tempted to throw it out the window?”

  Pentrothe smiled knowingly at Zensa. “It is difficult to face a magic that cannot be defended against, especially for the more powerful mages.”

  With a wave of his hand over the crystal globe it was once more filled with smoke. The fluttering bit that was once a moth flew back to the jar, hovered over its lifeless body for a moment and vanished.

  “If it’s just another way to kill something, why is it evil?” ask Jorem. “The moth would be just as dead if I had stepped on it. Wouldn’t that mean that a sword is evil as well?”

  “Very few objects can actually be considered evil,” Pentrothe explained. “It is the method of or reason for their use that marks them as evil.”

  Pentrothe began putting the globe and stones back into their box. He gestured to Zensa for her to explain this to Jorem. She looked at Jorem for a moment as if deciding if it was something he should know.

  “You have seen the Forbidden, so it is only right that you should understand why it is considered evil to the dragon sworn. You must promise never to speak of this to another. EVER!”

  Jorem nodded his acceptance. Pentrothe had entrusted him with a number of the mage’s secrets. By Zensa’s tone this secret was probably a bit more important than the formula for Pentrothe’s flash-powder. That the Dragon Mage would take him into her confidence was both exciting and frightening. He didn’t even want to think about the penalty for revealing such a secret.