The Hidden Illusionist

by Deck Davis

  “Is the city restored?” said Dantis. “I didn’t think I’d done enough.”

  “What you see here is the city as it…was. Before the Cataclysm, before the…Nevergods. My time void saved our city minutes before the cataclysm...hit, but Yutula-na will be forever stuck in this time until it is…restored.”

  “I heard of the Cataclysm, but they say it was so long ago. Who are the Nevergods?”

  “Look.”

  A stone next to Tula glowed orange, and rune marks lit across it surface. It throbbed, and the hum of it washed over Dantis. He approached it, the light becoming brighter with every step until the orange bathed him, and he couldn’t see anything else.

  The colors of Yutula-na disappeared. The throng of its inhabitants dropped, replaced by screaming.

  Above, storm clouds brewed, oil-black, forming shapes and twisting and moving. A face pressed through them. It was a hideous face, one Dantis could only look at for the briefest of seconds, because it hurt his eyes. It was like staring into the sun, except staring at this shape didn’t hurt his eyes, it pained his soul.

  Beside him, Tula crouched atop the largest stone in Yutula-na. This was a younger Tula, vibrating with energy. He muttered in his own language, repeating the same phrase over and over in what sounded like a prayer.

  The face rushed from the sky. Tula stood up. He started shouting the words now, waving his arms, with light gathering in his palms. He roared, and an arc of light coated Yutula-na as the world-ending force rushed down.

  The image changed now. Time seemed to flow quicker and quicker, and Dantis watched as Yutula-na sat under a changing sky, stayed lonely in a changing landscape. The sky went blue, black, blue, black as days flew passed in seconds. Around the ancient city, the landscape grew desolate, the dirt orange, and no people ever came. Yutula-na sat lonely for centuries. With each passing decade, Tula’s form seemed to lighten; he grew opaque, he shrank, until finally, he disappeared, living only as a rune glow in the largest of the city’s rocks.

  Centuries after the death of Tula’s physical form, a traveler galloped into the barrens on horseback, a robed figure with curly black hair and a pale face, and purple mana wisps crackling around her. She rode to the outskirts of the stone formations, and there, she kneeled.

  “I am here, Tula,” she said. “Here to restore you.”

  The vision faded, and Dantis found himself back in present Yutula-na, where Tula watched him.

  “I grow…weak,” he said. “I can only support this form for a…while, and I must retreat into my…stone.”

  “What was that? The giant face in the sky? Was that the cataclysm?”

  “You saw a…Nevergod. And now, the Nevergods…return. Tula cannot stop them this…time. But Dantis…can.”

  “How?”

  “You must lead the…vupyr.”

  Vupyr. That word again – he knew it. How?

  Memories flashed in a sequence, jutting through his mind so hard he winced.

  Mum screaming. A figure covering her, a dark shadow. Her face turning pale, her skin tightening against her face, her bones pressing through.

  An eyeball with a blood tar in the corner.

  The stone in front of him throbbed. With each vibration a whoosh of air hit him, and when he breathed it, he drew in not just wind, but time itself. He sucked days, weeks, years, decades into himself, the same way he used to breath spirit. Time swirled in his brain, it twisted and transformed into images and sound.

  He saw Zaemira pray at the foot of a stone in Yutula-na. Tula beckoned her in, his cosmic face glowing with the light of galaxies.

  He used a soul-gemmed dagger to cut a wound along his forearm, spraying his sparkling blood. Zaemira opened her mouth and drank it. She looked like she was going to vomit.

  “You are vupyr…now,” Tula told her.

  Images skipped. Scene after scene of Zaemira, with only the time and the place changing. Zaemira draining spirit from a farmer in the eastern isles. Zaemira in the snow villages of the northern edge of the isles, draining spirit from a fisherman bundled in a fur coat. Zaemira hiding in an alleyway in one of Budople’s spice markets, waiting for a street urchin to tumbled into her path.

  Different places, different decades, different centuries. Zaemira lasted through it all, Tula’s gift letting her drain spirit from people to drag her body past her mortal limits.

  “Is that what a vupyr is? They drain spirit to stay alive?”

  “A vupyr is of my…blood. I can…create, but some are …born.”

  “What does that have to do with me?”

  “Not everyone can become…vupyr,” said Tula. “You are one of the shadows…Dantis. You love…fear. Born human but not of human…parents. Adopted at…birth.”

  The walls of his sanity crumbled as doubt cracked the bricks.

  “You’re saying I was adopted? No. Ethan is my real brother. He’s older than me. He would have known mum wasn’t pregnant. He would have told me I was adopted.”

  “Ethan…knows.”

  “And he didn’t say anything to me?”

  Tula didn’t answer.

  ~

  Speed up, damn it. Can’t you go any faster? Time was running out. Not just for Zaemira; things were much worse than that.

  The wind blew her hair into her face, her curly locks covering her vision. A click of her fingers, and the spell was cast, and her hair didn’t bother her anymore. With her vision clear, she saw the mountain in the distance. The dirt path, the thatch work of trees where klizerds roamed, and then, nestled at the top, the guild house.

  The sky above was ocean blue, and birds flapped across it in formation, the lead bird ducking and the rest following. Most people would have said it was beautiful, but she knew differently. Beyond the blue, beyond how natural it looked, evil brewed.

  The Nevergods were weak enough that her spell, latched to the Elder Stone in Yutula-na so Tula could add his own powers to it, could hold them back. But if the Nevergods grew stronger, or if something happened to Zaemira, her defense would break. There would be no holding them back. The second Cataclysm.

  I can’t let myself get low again. So stupid. Risking everything for the boy.

  The acolytes surprised her by their ferocity on the Road of Repent. She’d imagined when they saw what she could do, they wouldn’t care about him enough to fight her for him. Unless they knew…

  She tapped her horse, urging him on. She’d never whip him; she didn’t need to. Force was a recourse where respect failed.

  She couldn’t afford to show the boy the same respect, unfortunately. There was no time, with the second Cataclysm brewing. Only two things could hold it back; restoring the ancient city so Tula could regain his powers and cast a fresh time void, or if Zaemira found an endless supply of mana.

  That wasn’t possible, of course. Mana was finite; what was used, must be replenished. Nothing could be created from nothing. Therefore, restoring the city was key.

  Years ago, with Lillian supplying her with teens from the guild who showed magical talent, and kidnappers in Wolfpine procuring other spell-enchanted boys and girls, she had started her plan. She experimented on her creations, cycling through successes and failures, until she worked out how to do it; how to create a Grubseed strong enough to restore the city.

  But it was too late. And now, she needed to get to Lillian before the Cataclysm found its way.

  Carriages appeared in the distance, eight of them with black robes figures standing on the front, whipping and lashing their horses to spur them on. Acolytes.

  Eight were too many, even for her, but she couldn’t die here. If she died, nothing would hold Infirna back. Him and his Nevergods would descend, and then…

  No. She couldn’t let it happen.

  Fire bolts whizzed toward her, streaming arrows arcing in the sky, flames twisting behind them, igniting across the sky. She wrenched fortitude from deep within, and she imbibed it with mana, casting a shield in front of her. The arrows crashed against it.<
br />
  Too many of them. I can’t die now. Dantis isn’t ready yet.

  She summoned fury from her heart, years of anger that burned deep. A tremoring rage built from Tula’s broken promises, from the oath that forced her into servitude, from her own mistakes, ones which had ruined her brother. It burned in her until she trembled with it. She wanted to scream, to roar, to curse everything and everyone in the fire isles.

  Trusting her horse to keep her course true, she held her hands in the air. Her rage channeled into her palms, and mana flowed from within, melding with the fury until it bubbled and spat and grew as a light. She couldn’t control it now. Her body jerked, and she almost fell off the horse. Forcing her concentration, she stretched her hands out, and the monstrous balls of fire and fury lashed out of her, plummeting across the plains, before crashing into the carts.

  Wood splintered and crackled, men screamed, horses reared. A blinding flash overtook the acolytes, scorching them deep in their souls until their carts turned and their horses crashed to the ground, and the acolyte’s cried out as the mana-fueled fury overtook them.

  Zaemira fell off her horse. She was weak. So weak. Her mana ran in her but it was less a river and more a babbling stream now. She’d used too much. She had to feed. She had to replenishing herself, or her defense against the Cataclysm would break.

  She climbed back on her horse and spurred it on. She was in a daze as the terrain whizzed by. Soon, the gates of Wolfpine loomed close. Plumes of smoke rose from the city, dozens of twisting tendrils of foggy black. The acolytes were in the city.

  Once through the gates, she climbed off her gorse. She stumbled onto the streets, her eyes searching for a person. A man, a woman, anyone.

  Something tugged on her robe. She looked to her right to see a child; a girl with golden hair, soot darkening her face, tears brimming on her eyes.

  “My parents,” said the girl, pointing to two corpses beside the road.

  Zaemira’s heart wrenched. So much waste, so many people caught up in the affairs of gods, people who wanted nothing more than to just live. This wasn’t about her, she realized. It wasn’t about just escaping her promise and breaking free from Tula’s oath so she could enjoy her immortality. There was more at stake than the happiness of one mage, of a woman who’d darkened her soul long ago.

  “I’m sorry,” said Zaemira.

  She grabbed the girl and began to feed.

  ~

  Tula showed him a vision again. He showed him the streets of Wolfpine, where ink-black clouds thundered and roared overhead, and a face pressed through the sky, a face full of rage and crackling with apocalyptic power.

  And below it, Ethan, his gem sword sticking from Zaemira’s chest, burning through her flesh, killing what spirit couldn’t save.

  A screech filled the sky. Something inhuman, the agonized sound of a dying planet. A spell fading, a barrier between the Fire Isles and the Nevergods breaking.

  It disappeared. Dantis stared into the flickering form of Tula, who grew weaker by the second.

  “So, you see…now?” said Tula.

  He and Ethan weren’t brothers. He and Ethan weren’t brothers! No matter how many times he said it in his head, the truth wouldn’t sink in. Yet, Tula had shown him, and Dantis knew the vision to be true. He believed it, but he didn’t want to.

  I knew it all along. Deep down, in some hidden place inside me. Some tiny, tiny shred of doubt. We don’t look the same. Our personalities couldn’t be any more different. I was born with magic, when there hasn’t been any magic in our family until now.

  “It is time for you to…become,” said Tula.

  “Become what?”

  “Like…me.”

  “And what the hell is ‘like you’? What are you Tula? Some cosmic ghost who can’t leave a forgotten city? Why would I want to be like that?”

  “Zaemira was running out of…time. It is now gone…It is…coming.”

  “What’s coming?

  “The second…Cataclysm. You must change…Dantis.”

  “Let me out of the city,” said Dantis.

  “There is one last thing you must…see.”

  Tula showed him another vision. The ancient city disappeared, and Dantis instantly knew where he was.

  He recognized the stone walls of their basement at home, and the chips in the bricks from where Ethan tried to learn to throw daggers. Dad’s alchemy bench was over in the corner, but purple liquid dribbled from smashed glass vials and smoked on the wood. His stool was turned over.

  He knew the scene now. It was a memory he’d locked away, one he’d never wanted to see. Now, he was inside it, forced to watch with no hope of escape. Where are you, Ethan? Can’t you get me out of this?

  Someone screamed. Dantis turned, and he saw his mother. Someone was atop of her, a black shape.

  Beside her was Dantis father, lifeless, his skin a husk, as if his vigor had been drained from his, as if…as if someone had drained the spirit from him, enough that he lost his essence.

  Mum’s screams cut short. Her skin changed too; wrinkles cut gouges in her face, so many she looked like a mummified corpse. Bones pressed against paper-thin skin, her hair was grey and brittle.

  Watching it, Dantis weakened. He felt like he could pass out, in fact he welcomed it, but it didn’t happen. At the same time, something burned in him. An anger he couldn’t let out bounced inside whatever his form was now, threatening to tear holes in him until there was nothing left.

  The figure rose from his mother’s body. Slowly, it turned. Time slowed to a stop, each second stretching out into infinity, until finally, Dantis saw the face.

  It was him.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Ethan

  “You have let this go on long enough. I hear that he returned from the dungeon, and not in a casket, as we agreed.”

  “It was the damn mage’s fault. He-”

  “Excuses. Now it’s too late. The time is near, and you better tell me you have assembled enough.”

  “Thirty recruits are ready, and eighteen are still submerged.”

  “Wake them.”

  “It’s too soon. Waking them early will destroy half their minds.”

  “Wake them. I will see you soon, and we will discuss your reward.”

  ~

  It was the first time he’d been in Bander’s room. The guild master’s quarters were off limits to everyone, even other instructors, but when Ethan begged Reck to let him see Bander, the grizzled trainer nodded.

  Inside, Bander’s quarters were nothing like he expected. Just a bed, on which lay Bander, and a desk piled with books. A few ornamental swords hung on the walls, and a window looked out onto the training yard.

  Bander looked paler than death. He wore a loose-fitting shirt stained with blood. Where his right arm had been, the shirt sleeve had been tied into a knot. Pity drenched Ethan, so much that he wanted to turn around and leave.

  “I look great, don’t I boy?” said Bander.

  Nothing he could think to say seemed right. What could he say about something like this? He walked cautiously forward, holding Artifax in his hand. The sword’s hilt gem was dull. When he tried to lay the sword next to Bander, it wouldn’t leave his grip. It seemed to be welded to his palm.

  “Something wrong?”

  “I can’t-”

  Bander smiled sadly. “He is yours now, Ethan. Bonded to you the way he bonded to me, once. A sword like Artifax keeps no master unless he chooses to.”

  “No. It’s not right. It’s your sword.”

  Bander coughed. Instead of the muscled guild master, Ethan looked at a man who had aged years in a matter of days. “It’s yours,” he said. “No more word of it.”

  “You seem a little…better than I expected.”

  “Life is hard, boy. Let doubt and regret take hold, and they’ll knock you down.”

  “Doubt and regret? You lost your fucking arm.”

  “No more of it. No talk of arms of swords. Why did you wa
nt to see me?”

  “I saw something in the dungeon,” said Ethan. “When the creatures attacked. Two of them jumped on you, and Lillian, he-”

  Bander smiled softly. “Spit it out, boy.”

  “He tried to kill you, Bander. I know it sounds crazy, but he tried to push you into the chasm.”