The Wolf

by Jean Johnson

  Broger smirked, a nasty, narrow-eyed, tight-mouthed little smirk. “As soon as you die, your powers will be transferred to your kinsman. My son. Oh, yes, I found and modified a spell that will enable me to do that!”

  A coppery-colored hawk dropped down from above, landing in a clear patch among the blue ichor still smeared on the floor. It transformed even as it landed, resolving itself into a mirror-carrying Trevan within a heartbeat. “What good would that do you, if young Barol had all the power? You would still have almost none, by comparison!”

  The smirk broadened into a sneer. “What would stop me from using the same magic on him that I can use on the lot of you?”

  “You would kill your own son?” Wolfer asked, contempt lacing his voice as he stepped into the archway of the southern hall.

  “Of course; you killed your own brother,” Koranen observed dryly, making his way between the courtiers on the western side as he joined Evanor and Kelly at the center of the donjon floor. “Why should we be surprised you’d kill your own son?”

  Broger shifted his platform in a slow circle, surveying the brothers. “Well . . . All we need are the last two, and the set is complete!—Is that running feet I hear?” he mocked, lifting a hand to his ear. Tilting his head upward, he triangulated on the sound; it was coming from the eastern wing of the palace. “Eager to destroy me, are you? I would hate to run away and leave you targetless in your disappointment.

  “Clever paint, by the way,” Broger added, nodding at the slowly shifting white of the clouds making their way across the currently blue-hued walls of the great hall. “That’s why I couldn’t focus the scryings anymore, isn’t it? Got tired of my little beasties, did you?”

  “Don’t kill him!”

  The shout from above distracted all of them. Morganen appeared at the topmost railing, all but throwing himself over the edge as he peered down at the tableau of his brothers ringing their enemy. He panted for a moment, then jerked his head up sharply, looking at something off to the side at his level of the hall that the others couldn’t yet see. A moment later, he looked back down, planted a hand on the carved stone railing—and jumped, chanting something.

  Kelly gasped, stumbling back a pace. Koranen caught her by the elbows as she bumped into him. Morganen landed on the platform right behind his uncle-in-law, making it bounce hard, jostling all three bodies on the hovering metal: Morganen’s, Broger’s, and the corpse that had been Donnock of Devries. They stabilized, but only for an instant. Scintillating light shot out from Morganen’s body.

  The moment it touched the others, the world wrenched around them. The half-shadowed interior of the donjon hall found itself replaced by the overcast but bright skies of the western cove. Three things happened in rapid succession: Wolfer, Saber, Trevan, and Rydan all yelled—they were not supported by the floor of the castle anymore, let alone the planks of the dock like the others—and their startled bodies splashed into the water in the next instant; an owl fluttered down from the sky and landed on one of the posts of the pier near Evanor; and Broger cursed, flinging Morganen away from him with a shove and a burst of magic.

  Given how the younger man was the westernmost of the two mages, the blow sent him flying backward over the end of the quay with a yell of his own, where he splashed into the salty waters of the cove. That left Koranen, Evanor, and Kelly still on the pier, facing Broger as he hovered over the scorched rune-circle etched on the planks of the dock, the body of his brother dangling precariously over the edge of his oversized, levitating platter.

  Morganen pushed up through the surface of the waves and gasped a command. “Kor! Ignite the runes!”

  The auburn-haired mage blinked for a moment, then shook it off and flicked out his arm. Flames rose up from the charred wood, surrounding their relative in dancing yellow, but not harming him in any way. Broger sneered at the attempt. “What do you think that will do? These runes aren’t meant to contain me!”

  “Not exactly,” Kelly bluffed. “They’re for me to use—to destroy you!” Pulling the mirror from behind her back, she thrust it at him and started chanting. “Abracadabra, Walla Walla, bibbity-bobbity-boo! Copperfield, Blackstone, Telemus, and you—”

  “Fasherwol!”

  Black energy slashed between them. Kelly braced her arm, flinching as Broger’s attack hit the mirror. The magic did flash back at its caster. It hit his left arm, but all it did was make the muscles turn limp. The mirror shattered, making Kelly shriek and huddle over her hand, clutching at it as it bled. Broger rebalanced himself on the floating metal disc. “Is that the best you can do?”

  Morganen, treading water, scowled. They needed the bastard to use lethal magic! Unfortunately, there was only one thing he could think of on the spur of the moment. “Apprentice! Reveal yourself!”

  “No!” Wolfer protested. “I still have the mirror!”

  It was too late; the owl leapt from its perch on the pylon, transforming back to her natural shape as she landed next to Evanor. Broger’s eyes widened as he stared at his niece.

  “Hello, uncle,” Alys greeted him, her face expressionless, but her tone dripping with loathing. This was the chore Kelly had prepared her for: being able to face her hated relative with courage, even though she had nothing to protect herself. “You’re looking rather fat and bald, as usual.”

  “Insolent brat!” the balding mage snarled at her. “I wondered why your magics didn’t come to me when all my spells said you were dead! An oversight I will correct—skaren skaroth!”

  A blade of light flung itself from his hand. Morganen clenched his fists, almost forgetting to tread water. Wolfer’s eyes widened in horror, as did his twin’s. Evanor shifted between Broger and his target. A single, reverberating note, and his magic flexed like a clear, rubber wall, bouncing the spell back at its caster.

  The older mage had just enough time to widen his eyes, to start to lift his hand again to try to cast a shield. The blade whipped over his fingertips, slicing deep into his chest. His body buckled and fell without a sound. As it slumped, a dark red bolt—as if lightning had been dipped in blood—arced out of his body and slammed into Evanor, thrusting him backward. The impact knocked Alys over as well, the two of them falling in a bruised tangle of limbs.

  “No!” Changing into his hardly used bird-form, Wolfer abandoned the water, fluttering awkwardly up to the surface of the dock on dripping wet wings. He hit the planks on his knees as he changed back, touching Evanor to see if his brother still had a pulse, his eyes meeting Alys’ as she blinked and struggled for breath under the blond mage’s weight.

  The rune-circle shifted from yellow-bright flames to orange red, roaring upward in a fierce conflagration. They seemed to form arms, demonically inhuman arms scaled in living tongues of fire. Arms that reached up, wrapped around Broger’s body where it had toppled from its hovering platform, and dragged him down to Elsewhere. The moment his body vanished, the flames died, leaving behind nothing. Not even scorched timbers.

  A gesture from Morganen, and the water around the dock calmed, turning mirror smooth. Climbing onto the hardened surface, he gestured again and mounted the steps that rose up out of the water. Saber scrambled out of the water, pushing past his youngest sibling as he hurried up onto the quay. His wife was still huddled protectively over her bleeding hand. “Kelly—”

  “Could you, uh . . . find my finger?” the freckled redhead asked him shakily, her aquamarine eyes wide and rather dilated with shock. “I seem to have lost it . . .”

  “I’ll handle it,” Morganen reassured both Saber and her. “A spell to reattach it, some potions to ensure it heals properly, and you’ll be as good as new! We’ve lost and reattached more than a few fingers over the years, in sword practices and botched experiments . . .”

  Wolfer was glad his sister-in-law would be fine. He was even more grateful that Evanor was alive; his heartbeat was strong, and his eyelashes were fluttering. Alys finished squirming out from underneath the blond mage just as Evanor roused. His eyes ope
ned, then squeezed shut in a wince; his hands shifted to his throat, and his mouth opened.

  Eyes snapping open, Evanor blinked and mouthed something, but only a hiss emerged. Horror dawned in his brown eyes. Only Wolfer and Alys, leaning over him, could hear the thread of breath-based sound that emerged. “My voice . . . I can’t . . . Sweet Kata—I’ve lost my voice!!”

  He wasn’t the only one who was horrified. “Morg!” Alys pleaded. “Evanor’s lost his voice! We have to do something!”

  “Finger first, voice second!” Morganen retorted. “I’ve got a narrow window to get this thing reattached before the spell won’t work. Trevan, I need you to cast a diagnostic spell on Evanor, find out exactly what’s wrong with him.”

  “There’re still beasts at the castle,” Rydan reminded the others, mounting the steps his youngest brother had formed from the sea, the last one to reach the pier. “They need to be destroyed.”

  “Wolfer, Alys, Koranen go with him,” Saber ordered as Morganen chanted over his wife’s injury. “We’ll catch up to you as soon as we can.”

  The noise in the donjon told the four mages where most of the beasts had gone, for there was no sign of them in the courtyards of the castle. Instead, the beasts—no doubt geased to attack anything that wasn’t Broger—had gravitated to the tempting-looking but utterly frustrating visages of the illusioned courtiers. Who were still following through on their last order from their queen, stomping on whatever attacked them.

  Koranen snorted, then glanced over at his brothers and impending sister-in-law. “As amusing as this is, if the three of you can set up a containment shield, I’ll torch the lot. A little heat won’t hurt the illusions.”

  One of the bone-monkeys fruitlessly sucking on the foot of one of the lady courtiers released its uncooperative victim, scampering toward Rydan. A dark look, a flick of Rydan’s finger, and the primate squealed, flinging back toward its brethren under the force of a sharp crack of quarter-sized lightning. Several mekhadadaks swarmed the briefly stunned, smoldering beast. It squealed, grabbed and bit, and it became a race to see which could eat the other faster; the mekhadadaks nipping bites out of its hide, or the bone-monkey sucking the chitin off the squirming, spider-like beasts.

  Repulsed, Alys suppressed most of a shudder, focusing on throwing up a globe-shaped shield between her, Wolfer, and Rydan as the three of them spread out, surrounding the melee. She shivered again when Koranen ignited the air inside the sphere. The courtiers burned, but they didn’t react like they were burning. They just continued to stomp as the flames seared pale and hot around them. When it was over, Rydan blew away the ashes with a gust of air, and Koranen began deactivating the courtiers, reducing them to thumb-sized glass beads.

  Wolfer wrapped her in his arms. “It’s all right. It’s over.”

  Rydan snorted. “Not until we’ve checked the whole castle.”

  “And the grounds outside,” Koranen agreed. “If we had Dominor . . . and Evanor’s voice . . . we could do a systematic inward sweep. We’ll have to check the castle a different way. And even then, a few beasties might escape our search.”

  “Seal each room behind you, after you’ve checked it,” Alys offered. She was snuggled against her Wolfer’s chest, and very happy that all of them were still alive, even if Kelly and Evanor had been harmed. “That’s what I’d do. Check and seal each room as we go, then everyone should be back up here in time to sweep the grounds.”

  “Supper will be rather late, then,” Wolfer observed dryly. “We won’t be free to sit down until everything’s been certified monster-free.”

  Rydan looked at his siblings. A disgusted noise escaped him. “You’re trying to convert me to live in the daylight hours, aren’t you?”

  “Oh, yes,” Koranen teased mock-solemnly. “You’ve just proved you can withstand the touch of sunlight, so there’s no excuse for you to—eep!” Dodging the swipe of his next-eldest brother’s hand, the redhead skipped backward with a laugh. “What? I’m just happy we’re all alive!”

  Well?” Evanor whispered as loudly as he could. He was seated on a stool in Morganen’s workroom, with most of the others arrayed around the room. They were waiting to hear the results from a more in-depth study of the problem than the cursory one Trevan had been able to give back down on the docks. The castle and its surrounding grounds had been swept for lingering monsters, leaving them free to attend to less urgent matters. Rydan had retired to the kitchen to fix their supper, and Dominor was still missing, but everyone else was present.

  Morganen met his gaze sadly and shook his darker blond head. “I’m afraid I cannot repair the damage. This requires Healing magic on a level none of us has mastered.”

  “But, you could repair my finger!” Kelly protested on her favorite brother-in-law’s behalf. “Why can’t you repair his vocal chords?”

  “Kelly, your finger was lying on the dock a few yards from where you lost it when the mirror exploded,” the youngest mage explained patiently. “It was just a matter of reattaching the severed limb and accelerating the natural healing process. In Evanor’s case . . . his voice simply isn’t there, anymore. No voice box. No vocal chords. There’s nothing for me to work with! I can reattach limbs, but the regeneration of lost and vanished body parts is beyond my skill.”

  Saber fixed him with a hard look. “You’re supposed to be the most powerful mage in all of Katan, Brother!”

  “Power, yes—I have the power to restore his voice,” Morganen agreed impatiently. “I just don’t have the spell. Even if I did, I wouldn’t dare try to restore something so important as Evanor’s voice without having had a lot of practice beforehand. A voice is an intricate instrument of the flesh, and Evanor’s doubly so, since it’s very much a part of his magical abilities.”

  “Leaving me virtually magicless,” Evanor whispered in the grim silence following Morganen’s words.

  “Yes. I’m sorry, Ev,” Morganen added, running his hand through his ash blond hair impatiently. “I’ll see if I can get a Healer to come out here from the mainland. Unfortunately, those that are powerful enough to cast Regeneration Charms are likely to be the kind who make their nests in the money-pouches of the Council.”

  “Who might forbid any of them to come out here,” Saber finished grimly.

  Even without vocal chords, the expletive that escaped the fourth-born brother was rather vehement.

  “My sentiments exactly,” Kelly muttered. Her hand was swathed in bandages to keep it from being injured further during the healing process, but it would recover with full mobility, according to Morganen. In that regard, she was luckier than Evanor. “We really need to work on opening diplomatic relations with the Council and the people of Katan, to get over and past this stupid prejudice they have against the lot of you.”

  Wolfer snorted. “Good luck.”

  Evanor’s lips moved, but whatever he had to say was lost as Koranen spoke up. “Wait—should we do anything about Evanor’s voice, just yet?”

  Evanor wasn’t the only one to blink at the suggestion. Saber stared at the second-youngest of them. “What do you mean, Kor?”

  “I mean, isn’t it part of his ‘Song’ verse for him to be silent? Or at least ‘weep in silence’?” the redhead offered.

  That made Morganen nod slowly, thoughtfully. “Yes . . . yes, I can see that. And it is intimated that his powers as the son who is the Song will be restored to him. It’s not guaranteed, of course . . . but it’s quite possible, Evanor, that your own future bride may have something to do with the restoration of your voice!”

  There was a general murmur from the others as hope rose among them. Evanor tried to speak, grew frustrated, and finally fitted his fingers into his mouth, blowing a sharp whistle. That silenced them, and made them strain to hear and understand his words. “Yes, but what about Dominor? His verse comes first, and in the meantime, I cannot Sing to him to let him know we’re still thinking of him, and still seeking a way to bring him home!”

  “I’m still ke
eping an eye on him,” Morganen promised. “That will have to be good enough. If your verse in the prophecy does indeed suggest that you will not recover your voice until the conditions for finding your own bride have been met, then you will just have to be patient, Ev. Your twin’s Destiny must be decided first.”

  Once again, the curse that escaped the blond mage’s lips passed with little more than a hiss of air.

  Alys touched his shoulder. “I do appreciate you stepping between me and my uncle, Evanor. I owe you my life. Anything you need me to do, just ask, and I’ll do it.”

  “Within reason,” Wolfer muttered, and grunted as Kelly elbowed him in the ribs. “What? There are certain things she will not be doing for him, because she’s still slated to be my wife! Not his.”

  Evanor had to content himself with a dirty look aimed at his older sibling.

  “What I’d like to know,” Koranen interjected, changing the subject, “is why my twin dragged us down to the docks like that. And what those arms in the flames were, and why I had to ignite them.”

  “I found a book referencing Dark Gates in my research,” Morganen told them. “Since we didn’t have access to a priest, I had to improvise with the next-best thing. Sorry, Alys . . . but the next-best thing was to make what the book called a ‘justice-sacrifice’ of your uncle’s soul to the Netherworlds. It requires killing the murderer who created the Gate on the very spot that the Gate was created. Either terminus will suffice, in order to close and seal both ends,” he added in explanation, “so wherever he Gated from is now sealed against the Netherhells breaking through into our world, as well as our dockside.

  “But there’s a catch. It has to be a just killing, one that restores the balance wrenched out of place by his original nefarious actions. In other words . . . a self-inflicted death.” A wry smile curved his lips. “Which, strangely enough, was exactly how we needed to stop him anyway, bouncing his magics back onto himself to keep his protections from lashing out and killing us—and don’t make that face, Evanor. You’re still alive. Try to be grateful for that.”