Biomancy

by Desdemona Gunn

  “And you might be?”

  “A friend of his. He’s not here anymore. Now who the fuck are you?”

  “A potential client of his. I heard a... rumor about him. I’m just doing some fact-checking.”

  “Come with me, then, Miss...?”

  “Incubore. Anixemeter Incubore, at your service, m’lady.” She dropped into a deep, dramatic bow and held out her hand when bent over. She didn’t take it. Some people.

  “Well then, Anixemeter, I might be able to help you out. But first, I need to know if I can trust you. Let’s get a drink.”

  “Gladly, m’lady. And, I didn’t catch your name.”

  “You didn’t, did you?” The woman walked out of the room, expecting her to follow. I swear, whatever happened to the polite, respectable women that knew how to respond to societal banter? Ugh. Regardless, she followed her.

  They walked out of the college, down a few blocks, and into a tavern with a large wooden sign labeled ‘The Howling Jackal,’ complete with the appropriate beast and action carved into it. The inside was dark, furnished with fine wood, and had probably ten tables and a bar that could seat maybe twelve. A Milaric woman stood behind the bar, her horns protruding as far as her wrists would stretch.

  The leathered woman sat down at the bar, ordered a bottle of whiskey and looked at Ani expectantly. “A glass of your finest absinthe, if you please.”

  “What in the hells’s absinthe?” The bartender spoke with a thick drawl of an accent, giving her a puzzled look with all four of her eyes. Typical.

  “Never mind that, then. I’ll take a mead.”

  “Dark or light?”

  “Dark.”

  “Comin’ up.”

  “So, Anixemeter, what do you want with my friend?”

  “Well, rumors tell me that not only is he one of the finest students AIB has ever seen, but that that statement could stretch to Tyrecho, Terathor, or even Aramoor. I hear he can cast out of any school competently, and he’s a master of at least five. I also hear that he’s the best Alterationist alive.”

  “You hear a lot. What do you want with him?”

  “Well, my sister and I are going out on an expedition shortly, hoping to uncover some untamed land. My sister’s an arcanist, but is more proficient in the healing arts. I, on the other hand, fought in Octavian’s Rebellion, and am still quite competent in melee combat. We’re in need of an offensive caster.”

  “If you want offensive, you’ve found the right guy,” she muttered. “Which side did’ja fight on?”

  She looked at her carefully, trying to read which answer she was expecting. Reading a lady as starry as her, she found, was practically impossible. “I fought to usurp the false queen,” she stated as the bottle and horn hit the bar before them.

  They both thanked the bartender before she turned back to Ani and nodded. “I can appreciate that. You’re an idiot, but I can appreciate your faith. Before you shoot anything back at me,” she said calmly as Ani attempted dissent, “I’m not here to talk politics. Go on with your story.”

  Ani restrained from glaring at her, and calmly continued. “As I said, we’re going out on an expedition and need some men. We don’t know what dangers await us, so we need a competent party. If the rumors are true, we could use a spell-slinger like Mister Arroway on our team.”

  The woman studied Ani for a short time before speaking again. “Where are you headed?”

  “We’re not sure yet. My sister is looking into locations currently. All we know is it will be isolated. After the expedition is complete and we have founded a new base of operations, we’ll hopefully hire on your friend for continued work.”

  “First off, base of operations for what, exactly?”

  “A base of operations for her projects. As I said, she’s a master of the healing arts, and she’s experimenting with a new approach.”

  “What kind of new approach?”

  “I can’t divulge details without first making a deal, Miss...”

  She sighed. “NicCarmaig.”

  “Miss NicCarmaig.” The words poured out of her mouth like honey as satisfaction curled the edges of her grin. “Vol’Tyrian.”

  “Gee. What gave you that idea.”

  “I need to strike a deal with the man of topic here before I can let him in on our... trade secrets. Just know that this practice has not been unveiled, researched, or utilized whatsoever outside of my sister and I. New ground is being broken. Based on what I’ve been told, if I know your friend, which I don’t, he’s the kind of man that thrives on new information.”

  Again, she stared at Ani silently for a short time. Hitting the nail on the head so far. Good. “Secondly, what kind of work are you hoping to hire him for?”

  “Research and development, mostly. Second opinions on our work, an extra hand to help with the experiments and research, both in brain and raw casting ability, and if needed, a man of his caliber could be useful for both diplomatic and combat means.”

  She laughed for the first time, finally showing something outside of defensiveness. “He won’t be much use in the diplomacy department.”

  Ani laughed in response. “I did say if necessary.”

  She continued to study Ani, an air of apprehension between them. “Okay. I can’t always be his keeper. If he don’t like you, suits him. I’ll point you his way.” She slammed back the bottle of whiskey, draining five or six shots worth, and slammed it back onto the bar before giving her directions to a building in the middle of town.

  She opened the door to the rooftop, having waited until the new dess had started, as per her directions. The light of Yuma bathed the rooftop, unimpeded by clouds, and Ani shivered in the midwinter cold. Gods, she thought as she walked onto the roof, snow crunching beneath her boots. The sun can’t come up fast enough. Fuckin’ snow.

  It was just now that she was finally beginning to regret coming both alone or at all to meet with possibly one of the world’s most powerful sorcerers when he was at his most emotionally unstable, angry, and prone to violent outbursts. No, she thought, she told me he’d be fine.

  She looked around and behind her, just as the woman said, she found a man sitting on an angular trunk. He had flowing locks of curly blond hair, a gaunt figure, and was slouched over, elbows on his knees, hands dropped between his open legs. A dagger was bouncing through the air between his hands, spinning up then coming down as he caught the handle with the other hand.

  A cloak, dark as the winter sky behind him, strained against his body to billow in the breeze, but it was cinched tight to combat the cold winter winds. His hood was up, blocking the majority of view of his head, though his hair and figure were clearly visible. A pipe stuck out of his mouth, straight and smoking even against the wind.

  Before she could open her mouth, the man’s hand was in the air, knife blade pointed at her while a dull grey pulsed from both his clenched fist and the etched runes on the blade. “The fuck you want?” He spoke it as less of a question, more of a demand.

  “Mister Arroway, I presume?” A small section of rock exploded with a shower of snow just before her feet, making a crater the size of a coin.

  “I asked you a question.”

  “My name is Anixemeter Incubore, and I’m here to hire you.”

  “You the one Cherry warned me about?”

  “... I assume so? Nojerna, covered in leather and rings, interesting hair?”

  He didn’t answer, just kept the blade pointed at her.

  “Did she fill you in on my reason for coming?”

  “She did.”

  “You don’t trust me?”

  Again, no answer.

  “Look-” She stepped forward and another patch of snow exploded under her.

  “Did I say you could get closer?” The dagge
r in his hand glowed a soft white.

  “I don’t suppose you did.” She stared at the blonde man who had yet to look up from his black cloak. “I hear you’re one of the finest wizards to grace this age.”

  “You could say that.”

  “Would there be a more apt description?”

  “Dropping the ‘one of’ would be a good start.”

  Ani laughed. “The finest. Certainly the finest meta-mage.”

  “There you go.”

  “My sister and I could use a man like you.”

  “Yeah?”

  “We could.” A silence befell them for a short time. “Are you available?”

  “For?”

  “Work.”

  “My time is valuable.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “Funny, that’s what I answered.”

  “You don’t play well with others, do you?”

  “I don’t take orders well, nor do I react well to threats.”

  “So I gathered from the man with half an arm.”

  Finally, she detected a smirk from his face. “What do you want with me?”

  “Protection, for a time, then your input. We’re breaking new ground here, Mister Arroway, and we need only the smartest minds in on this project. Based on what I’ve found, you are the best at what you do, that being magic. We want you in on what could be the turning point in our world’s history.”

  “How delightfully vague. Now then, how ‘bout answering me this time?”

  “We want you to be one of the founders of immortality, Mister Arroway. My sister has found a way to cure any ailment, repair any broken body, and bypass mortality. The scientific and arcane arts have always been polar opposites, battling each other for control of the modern age. She has found a way to blend them together into one beautiful art form. She calls it Biomancy.”

  For once, Elon looked up at her. His eyes were a striking blue, eyes that seemed to bore into her soul, a talent Anixemeter held in esteem. He’s a little too good at that. “Sounds too good to be true, but you have my attention, Miss Incubore.”

  “Please. Ani.” She smirked and walked closer. “We will probably be leaving in a little less than ten turns. I hear you’re quite proficient in all schools of magic.”

  “You could say that.”

  “I could say a lot of things, it seems.”

  “You could.”

  “Well, I need to work out specifics with you, and I’d like my sister to be present. How are you at teleportation?”

  “To places I’ve been? Fantastic. To places I’ve seen or know of? Maybe. To an area I’m unfamiliar with? Don’t bet on it.”

  “You ever been to Voorhaven?”

  “Can’t say I have. If you’ve lived there, I can get a friend to tap your mind and probably send you there.”

  “Tap my mind?”

  “If I can get a solid memory, I can probably shoot you there in one piece.”

  “Probably?”

  Elon grinned. “Probably.”

  Chapter 27: Laughing Figments

  The City of Arghan’Sul, Ghostfire Prefecture

  She was awakened from her nap to a sound she knew well and affectionately deemed “The Meal Whoosh.” A rune glowed on the floor as the artificial wind seemed to sound and a plate with a sandwich appeared on it in a flurry of ashy tentacles. Well. Dinner.

  The schedule was becoming quite clear to her. Waking whoosh meant a few slices of rye-grain bread, sometimes accompanied by a serving of butter. Second whoosh was the big meal of the wake, which consisted of a wheat of some kind accompanied by a few sides that changed depending on the season. The meals changed every four sleeps, moving between oatmeal, a bread sop with a stew or broth, porridge, and a heartier standalone bread. She imagined this was simply to allow the prisoners to not grow bored.

  The sides cycled as well, usually including a cheese (cycling between hard and soft white cheeses) and, depending on the season, a fruit (a rotation of apples, pears, plums, and berries), vegetables (fermented cabbage, roasted garlic, carrots, and a spiced bean paste), some nutritive algae (spicy, roasted, steamed, and sautéed in butter), or fungal steaks (savory, sweet, spicy, and sour).

  A few cents after the dinner whoosh was exercise time, which she learned was, in fact, mandatory. Go out, run around, get your exercise with real equipment, not just sit-ups and push-ups, not like she had the room to pump out real push-ups in her cell. A while after they were sent back inside would be the supper whoosh, which was always the side-plate from earlier, but opposite the current rotation. She saw a staunch rye bread with ricotta and cabbage waiting for her, meaning she already knew there’d be parmesan and carrots waiting for her. The peppery aroma overpowering the candied licorice meant she was treated to kimchi rather than the typical sauerkraut.

  Across the hallway sat her scruffy Milakrian friend, who by now had quite the impressive beard. When asked, he simply said he got tired of prison personnel getting that personal with a sharp blade. After all, they knew better than to give him his own.

  “Oy, Albreight.”

  “What, really? After nearly six turns in the joint, you’re still sticking with ‘Albreight?’ We had to use our last names in the job, we’re both civvies now, you and I.”

  “Fine. By the gods. Hey, Liam.”

  “Wakin’, Osa!” He took a big, satisfied bite of his green and red cabbage meal. “Fuck, I love kimchi. I’m surprised; the spices are exquisite. Normally our food’s bland as shit.” He took another bite and smiled.

  “Ugh. Never had a taste for spicy, even in Gorenya. Sure, it’s got the best, b—”

  “Fuckin’ right it does. Amazing spice trade there.”

  “But they hurt my mouth. I mean, I grew up in a little town, middle of a desert. I never got spice. After I tried it in Gorenya, it just tasted... weird.”

  “What’d you eat?”

  “Plain food, grainy spices, not hot stuff.”

  “You guys had cow out there?” He asked through a full mouth.

  “Yeah, got some from traders. No chicken, no pig, though pig’s not bad. Not much plants, more fungus.”

  “Man, you guys get any meat? I love meat. I miss meat...” He said dejectedly.

  “There was the cow. We had a whole lotta lizard meat, lotta rompo, and whenever one of our fighters’d take down a grootslang, the whole place would get a feast for more’n half a turn, that was great. That warrior’s family’d eat for a few turns easy. If they survived it, anyway.”

  “Those things real? I always thought they were an over-exaggerated bedtime story.”

  “A what now?”

  “A... Like, a tall tale. Blown up in proportion. Made out to be a bigger deal than it actually is.”

  “Nah, out in the Avazi? Biggest grootslang I saw musta been longer than a hundred meters.”

  “Mauve’s light. You’re kidding me.”

  “Nope.”

  “You know how long that is?”

  “Yep.” She stretched her arms out in a hopeless attempt to show the length of the beast. “Huuuuge. Oh, and we ate cats too.”

  “What? How could you eat the kitties?” Liam’s eyes grew in size as a comical frown coated his entire chin, to which she dropped her head and raised a brow.

  “You call a thing bigger than two of me with muscles to jump a damn house from a sit and the jaw to bite me in half a ‘kitty?’ Those things are fucking scary.”

  “Mauve’s fucking light, you are shitting me. That’s obscene.”

  “Ob-what?”

  “Wha- Gods, your lack of vocabulary kills me.”

  “My what?”

  “Words! You don’t know words!”

  “No, I was a little busy not gettin
g eaten by giant ‘kitties’ and grootslangs.”

  “Ugh. Obscene. Fuck, how do you define that? Shocking? Abhorrent? Egregious? Repugnant?”

  “Not helping.”

  “Like, not right? It’s... It’s crazy, that’s what it is. Shocking.”

  “Okay. Got it. Greejus and awdseen.”

  “Egregious and obscene, yes. I swear you’re learning something new every time you talk to me.”

  “I doubt it. I forget most of what you tell me.”

  “That’s just ‘cause you’re belligerent.”

  “Bellige-what?”

  He grumbled and shook his fists randomly in a violent fashion and muttered back, “forget it” sprinkled with expletives before lying down.

  She was jarred awake by a ringing against their metal bars. The guard yelled into the cells in his disgustingly thick North-Milakrian accent, putting even Liam’s to shame. “Yard time. Get the fock out ‘n run, ye stupid bastards.”

  Like every dess for the past five turns, she calmly sat in her cell, waiting. Inevitably, the Atrok she knew quite well at this point, despite not knowing the name of, was at her bars opening the door. “Ik’thar’s blade, we gotta do this every fockin’ time I let you out?”

  “I guess.”

  “Get out, for the lords’ sake.”

  She stared at him expectantly, but as he sighed and leaned towards her, she lifted out of her coil. “All right, all right. I’ll go.”

  “Can’t make my life easy, now can ye?”

  “That’d be wrong.” As she slithered by the guard who, after all this time, was finally comfortable enough with her to let her brush by him rather than slink by at a distance, she swept her thick tail behind his knees and swept around in a circle, sending him back. The Atrok was quick on his feet as his lower arms shifted effortlessly into front legs, flipping over to catch himself. Fuck.