The Phoenix Transformed

by James Mallory

  The Isvaieni muttered uneasily, but the close-packed density of the crowd began to diminish as the people moved away from each other, preparing to depart. A few people actually walked away, but not many.

  “No!” Zanattar’s protest was quick and harsh. “Your pardon, Bisochim, but I have seen what these creatures can do. Already they have struck at us here in our place of safety—I will not leave you alone so that they may slay you and strip us of all shield against their evil magic.”

  “ ‘Evil magic.’ ” Bisochim didn’t just sound tired now, he sounded utterly spent. Tiercel glanced at Harrier. Harrier’s face was set in hard lines of determination, and Tiercel didn’t dare take the risk of trying to talk to him now. There were too many people still here who could misinterpret anything he might say.

  “The only evil magic here is that of the Shadow-Touched, who has led you upon the path of folly, Zanattar,” Shaiara said coldly.

  “Shadow-Touched indeed, Shaiara—but it is the Nalzindar and their Ummara who are Shadow-Touched, to offer their protection to Demons,” Zanattar answered brutally. “And so I say again—what is to be done here must be done in the sight of all, so that we may see that the Demons are truly slain.” Zanattar put one hand on the hilt of his sword and one hand on the haft of his knife and stared from Shaiara to Bisochim.

  “You dare—” Shaiara began.

  “I say they are not Demonspawn.” Bisochim took several quick steps forward, his face drawn in an expression that might be anger and might be grief. “And I say—again—I will hear their words alone.” Zanattar stepped back in surprise, his hands tightening on the hilts of his weapons, even though Bisochim was still several yards away.

  It won’t work. Tiercel could already tell. Bisochim was supposed to be the powerful Dark-tainted Wildmage who was bringing the Dark back into the world, who’d sent the Isvaieni to destroy the String of Pearls. And the Isvaieni weren’t going to obey him. The crowd had stopped moving away when Zanattar had spoken, and now nobody was moving anywhere at all. In another moment, Zanattar would reach for his sword, and then Harrier would draw his swords, and then Bisochim would do . . . something, and it would all go wrong. Even speaking out to try to stop it could tip the balance in the wrong direction. There was utter silence.

  “Come, Zanattar, lend me your strength. It is a long walk back to my tent and the shadows lengthen,” Liapha said brightly.

  Tiercel began to count slowly and silently, holding his breath. He’d reached “ten” before Zanattar took the first reluctant step toward Liapha. When he arrived at her side, she reached up to grip his shoulder with her free hand and began to chatter amiably about roasting a goat, or even several goats, or perhaps even one of the Kareggi’s great bullocks if Zanattar could make Fannas see that the foolish beasts were better eaten than coddled. Once Zanattar began to walk with Liapha, the rest of the Isvaieni turned and slowly followed.

  Tiercel let out his breath in a long sigh. Beside him, Harrier was still tense and quivering. “Harrier—” he began.

  “Don’t,” Harrier said tightly. He took a step forward, reaching up to draw his swords, but Bisochim had turned his back and was walking away as if none of them existed.

  Harrier let his hands drop and followed him. Even though he wasn’t actually holding his swords, he was pacing after Bisochim like a cat stalking a bird, and although Harrier didn’t look as if he was moving that fast, Tiercel had to hurry to keep up. The only reason he didn’t grab Harrier to stop him was because he had no particular desire to get knocked sprawling.

  Bisochim walked back to the place Tiercel had first seen him and sat down again. Harrier loomed over him. Tiercel reached Harrier’s side a moment later, sure that now he was going to have to do . . . something.

  But Harrier was just standing there.

  “We really did come here to kill you, you know,” Harrier said. He didn’t sound angry now. He just sounded really irritated.

  “Har!” Tiercel said.

  “He tried to kill us!” Harrier said defensively.

  “I deserve death,” Bisochim answered.

  “We’re too late,” Tiercel said.

  He’d known it, out in the storm, but he hadn’t wanted to admit it—to himself or to the others. They’d all just kept going. Because of Harrier’s MagePrice. Because there was nothing else to do. Because the fact that they’d failed (he’d failed) was too enormous to think about.

  Harrier looked at Tiercel, looking as irritated as a wet cat. “Isn’t he supposed to be Tainted now? He isn’t Tainted.”

  “How can the Shadowed One not be Tainted?” Shaiara demanded, approaching the three of them warily. “He who has led the tribes into madness, who has twisted their minds with the Wild Magic, who has led them to slaughter the people of the Iteru-cities like the sheshu in their burrows.”

  “Well, he isn’t!” Harrier snapped in exasperation. “And unfortunately, I’d know.”

  “If you will not kill him, then I will,” Shaiara said grimly. She reached out to draw one of Harrier’s swords.

  “Oh, no, wait,” Tiercel said, grabbing for Shaiara at the same moment Harrier stepped sideways out of her reach. Shaiara elbowed him painfully in the ribs and Tiercel staggered back. “He’s—You—” Tiercel stopped. He had no idea what to say. Why did you call up a Demon? Are you immortal now? Why aren’t you Tainted? Do you have a dragon? Every question he could think of to ask Bisochim seemed unbearably stupid.

  Harrier walked a few steps away, sat down on a chest, and pulled off his chadar. He scrubbed his face and neck with it, shook it out, and then carefully wrapped it back into place again. Then he just sat there, hands dangling between his knees. Tiercel stared at him until he saw a flash of light out of the corner of his eye. Shaiara and Ciniran were digging through the litter of things in the sand, and Shaiara had found a knife. She got to her feet.

  “You led the Isvaieni to slaughter,” she said to Bisochim. “You made them your tool to kill thousands more. You meant my people to do the same.” She took a long step forward. “Yet in the name of what you once were, I shall grant that which you ask.”

  “Shaiara, don’t,” Tiercel said. “We need him.” He was staring at Bisochim, unwilling to look away.

  Harrier laughed raggedly. “For what, Tyr? To do whatever he did again?”

  “To tell us what he did so we can try to fix it,” Tiercel answered steadily.

  “I put Darkness into flesh. For love,” Bisochim said in a low voice.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Tiercel saw Shaiara stop moving. She and Ciniran stood as if they’d been spell-struck, and didn’t move again. If either Shaiara or Harrier had moved or spoken, Tiercel thought Bisochim might have stopped talking, but he could almost feel the unnatural stillness on either side of him. He didn’t dare look away from the man sitting at his feet.

  “Tell me what you did,” Tiercel said quietly.

  Afternoon became twilight as Bisochim spoke, his voice barely louder than a whisper. He spoke of Saravasse, his Bonded, of the shortness of her years once they had been linked to his, of his conviction from the moment he first took up the Three Books that there was some riddle the Wild Magic meant for him to unfold, of withdrawing from the world, coming to this ancient place of power, setting his feet upon the path that led to his conviction of an imbalance in the Wild Magic. He spoke of years of careful exploration that had led him to the conclusion that Darkness must be reborn, of his careful plans and safeguards to ensure that the tiny spark of Darkness he summoned into the world would be harmlessly entombed, of having those plans spiral farther and farther out of control . . .

  “They used you and they lied to you,” Tiercel said quietly.

  “Yes,” Bisochim answered simply. “I have set Ahairan free to do as she will. I have saved no one. I have gained nothing.”

  “And we’ve lost,” Harrier said, speaking for the first time. But there was a note of uncertainty in his voice.

  “No,” Tiercel answered. For the f
irst time since he’d lost Ancaladar—a wound that would never heal—Tiercel felt the tiniest spark of hope. He didn’t know what would work, but for the first time in sennights, he could think of things to do. “I don’t think . . . Not yet. All right. Yes. This doesn’t match my vision. My vision was warning me not to let the woman in the Lake of Fire get what it was she wanted, and I guess she’s already got that, but there’s only one of her, and individual Endarkened have a lot of power, but they can be trapped, just the way Bisochim was planning to.”

  “That isn’t really a good solution,” Harrier said, after a moment. He got to his feet and came to stand beside Tiercel, moving carefully through the drifts of soft wet sand. Though it was nearly full dark now, neither Tiercel nor Harrier had conjured up a globe of light.

  But this is the answer, it has to be, Tiercel thought with rising excitement. If he’d been born with the MageGift, others would be too. “It doesn’t have to be,” Tiercel said. “Not a permanent solution. Just a temporary one. A High Mage and a Wildmage working together can kill a Demon. We just need to imprison Ahairan until a new High Mage can be born—found—and trained—and—”

  “I cannot,” Bisochim said starkly. “Have you not paid heed to the tale I have told? Were I able to trap the creature, she would already be at my mercy.”

  “All right then,” Harrier said briskly, into the echoing silence that followed Bisochim’s words. “If you can’t do it, somebody else has to. The Elves have lots of dragons. You have to go and tell them to come here. That’s what you said,” he added, nodding to Tiercel.

  “Send the Tainted One to the Veiled Lands?” Ciniran spoke for the first time since they’d arrived here at the lakeside. She sounded appalled.

  “There are Dragonbond Elven Mages in the Veiled Lands, and Bisochim has a dragon,” Harrier said, logically. “His dragon can fly through Pelashia’s Veil, and . . . I guess Tiercel’s going to have to go with him.”

  “What? Me?” Tiercel said. He couldn’t believe Harrier was making this suggestion in the first place—and from his tone of voice, neither could Harrier. Tiercel didn’t want to go back to the Elven Lands and explain to Idalia that he’d failed. He didn’t want to look down at the earth below from the back of someone else’s dragon, either. He couldn’t believe that Harrier thought this was a good idea. Maybe Harrier just thought it was the only idea.

  “Unless you think Vairindiel Elvenqueen and whoever’s at House Malkirinath now is going to take Bisochim’s word for it, yes, Tyr, you.” Harrier held out his hand, and a small globe of blue fire began to grow on his palm. “And bearing in mind that I’m not sure the Elves didn’t know exactly who you were looking for and where he was before you left Karahelanderialigor. But if you go, and explain, they should be willing to help, and enough of them, working together, should be able to find and imprison this Ahairan.” The globe of blue fire left Harrier’s palm and began to rise upward, continuing to grow. Harrier began to make a second one. “I’m going to go see if that lake’s safe to drink.” Harrier turned and walked off, just as casually as if he weren’t walking away from the Wildmage he and Tiercel had been chasing for over a year. One of the globes of Coldfire followed him, the other remained where it was, casting stark blue shadows on Bisochim’s face. In the darkness, the Coldfire’s azure radiance turned everything to shades of gray.

  Tiercel glanced over his shoulder toward the Isvaieni encampment, only now—belatedly—remembering that there were thousands of people only a couple of miles away who thought that he and Harrier were Demons and wanted them dead. But apparently they weren’t willing to come back to the cliffs—where the cliffs had been—after Bisochim had sent them away. Tiercel saw the faint lights of lanterns, the larger brighter lights of cookfires, spread out over hectares of desert, but in the space between, he saw no moving figures.

  When he looked back in Bisochim’s direction again, Tiercel saw that Shaiara and Ciniran had gotten to their feet without a single word spoken and followed Harrier. When the three of them had walked around the edge of the dune, Tiercel and Bisochim were alone. Tiercel realized the others had planned it that way, expecting him to convince Bisochim to summon Saravasse and fly to the Elven Lands right now.

  Because you’re the Anointed Champion of the Light, Tiercel thought bitterly. Everyone’s been saying so for moonturns. Probably even for years. For a moment Tiercel wondered why Harrier hadn’t stayed to at least try to protect him—and then he realized what Harrier already knew. If Bisochim wanted him dead—wanted any of them dead—there was nothing any of them could do to stop him.

  “I . . .” He started to say something—something that would make Bisochim do what they wanted—but the words changed themselves without his conscious thought. “I’m sorry she’s going to die,” he said instead.

  Bisochim raised his head to look at Tiercel. “You cannot understand,” he said bleakly.

  “I—” The words dried up in Tiercel’s throat, choking him, and it was a long moment before he could speak. “His name was Ancaladar,” Tiercel whispered. “I don’t know why I’m still alive.”

  “You are the Dragonbond Mage,” Bisochim said in disbelief.

  “I was,” Tiercel answered. Bisochim must have known that one of the two of them was a Dragonbond Mage, but he must have assumed it was Harrier. He would have sensed Harrier’s Wildmagery, but Harrier had never been able to sense Tiercel’s MageGift, so Bisochim wouldn’t have either.

  “How can you yet live?” Bisochim asked simply.

  “I don’t know,” Tiercel said, swallowing hard. “Everybody—Harrier—says he—Ancaladar—isn’t dead. Even after he . . . went away, I . . . I knew I had to come here to—To stop you. For almost a year I—I had visions. Of the—Of Ahairan. You have to help us. You have to take Saravasse and fly to the Elven Lands.”

  “No,” Bisochim said bleakly, turning his face away. “You do not understand. She . . . my Bonded, my beloved, she begged me to give up my madness. But all I could see was the death to which my love had doomed her. How can I call her to my side, gaze into her eyes, and allow her to see what my pride and folly have done? Never. Never will I summon Saravasse to me again. Never.” He got to his feet and began to walk away.

  “No, but—Wait! You—” Tiercel grabbed for Bisochim’s sleeve, but his fingers closed over empty air. Suddenly Bisochim simply wasn’t there.

  Tiercel spun wildly in a circle. A spell. It has to be. Knowing that wasn’t much comfort. Tiercel knew all the spells of invisibility and distraction that Ancaladar had taught him. True invisibility was a spell nearly impossible to achieve—there were too many small traces that might reveal one’s presence—the way the light fell, footprints on the ground, the shift of the air, sounds. But everywhere Tiercel looked—in the grass, in the spilled sand—there was nothing. He even ran in the direction he thought Bisochim might have gone—arms flailing wildly—and touched nothing. Even calling up his own globe of MageLight to illuminate the grass was useless. After a few minutes, he gave up, shaking his head in frustration. If Bisochim was determined not to call Saravasse, there weren’t that many places he could go. He wouldn’t just walk out into the desert, because he’d die, and if he died, Saravasse would die too. But that didn’t mean Tiercel would be able to find him. Bisochim could just walk down into the encampment and be welcome in any tent, the way Shaiara and Ciniran said the Blue Robes always were. If any of the four of them tried it, though, they’d probably get their throats cut.

  But regardless of where Bisochim might be right now, he wasn’t somewhere Tiercel could talk to him, so he supposed he should go and tell the others that he’d failed. Spectacularly. He turned and retraced his steps in the direction the others had gone, his globe of MageLight hovering above him to light his way. When he got around the end of the dune, he saw Harrier a few hundred yards further away, kneeling by the edge of the lake.

  The lake water looked black in the darkness, even though Harrier had his ball of Coldfire hovering above him. The lake
’s surface was gently steaming, but if it had been the source of all the steam from earlier today, it had cooled a lot since then. By the light of Harrier’s Coldfire, Tiercel could see that there were a few things floating on the surface of the lake—wooden boxes, and bowls, and some things he couldn’t identify. Glancing back over his shoulder, Tiercel could see that the lake-side of the dunes spilled directly down into the lake.

  “The sand’s still wet,” Harrier said, when Tiercel reached him. “When it dries, it will probably all slide into the lake. Or blow away. I wonder where it came from?”

  “What?” Tiercel asked blankly. He couldn’t imagine why Harrier even cared about something like that right now.

  “The sand,” Harrier said, not looking up. “This is regh-desert. You know: no sand for a moonturn’s ride or more. So where’d it come from? Also, I walked a little way around it. The lake is round. And hot.” Harrier cupped water in his hand and flicked it at Tiercel. The water wasn’t actually hot, but it was warm. “I bet it was boiling earlier,” he added.

  Tiercel didn’t say anything.

  “When is Saravasse getting here?” Harrier asked. When Tiercel still didn’t say anything, Harrier looked up. The ball of Coldfire right above him cast his face into sharp contrasts. His skin looked white, the fortnight’s growth of beard black. His chadar was pulled forward as it had been earlier in the day. His eyes were in shadow. He stared upward until Tiercel was forced to answer.

  “He said he wouldn’t call her. He said he wouldn’t ever call her again. Then he cast some kind of spell and vanished,” Tiercel said brusquely.

  Harrier sighed and stared back down at the water. “I wonder where the cliffs went and why all this sand is here,” he said musingly.