The Emperor's Mage

by Clark Bolton

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  “How did you get them to search?” Rish asked with a grin.

  Ich-Mek smiled to himself. “I just started teaching rune-sets. They watched, then I encouraged them to find more. Anything with the word ‘Owesek’ near it.”

  Rish shook his head in astonishment. “I could never teach in front of so many instructors.”

  “It was hard at first,” he admitted, “but each time they found something…it was like, wow! Something new…something helpful.”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, nothing yet,” Ich-Mek admitted as he went back to the stack of spell-scrolls Rish had delivered to his cell. “But they are coming back to do it again tomorrow.”

  “And the Regent doesn’t care?”

  “Let’s…not think about that right now.”

  He began going through the small stack again. He had concluded the vast bulk of the spell-scrolls were simple cantrips. On top was a copy spell, the location spell, and now a resistance-to-cold spell. This last one he began looking over again. It was as complex as the location spell, which set the two apart from all the others he had read so far.

  “Good on a cold night, I guess,” he muttered to himself as he set it aside.

  “Ohhh…teach that one!” Rish exclaimed. “My cell is freezing sometimes.”

  Ich-Mek looked to his friend, then down at the ring on his own finger. “How about you start with a cloud cantrip?”

  Rish’s ability to speak arcane-script was abysmal – this Ich-Mek had concluded over a year ago. How any self-respecting instructor could have let his friend languish in one of the most crucial areas of study at Key-Tar-Om was nothing less than astounding to him. Then he recalled the crumbling peg-board Tang had built. Rish was a testament to the existence of minor paths on that board, and, he assumed, of the real one he had yet to confirm existed.

  “If you can do the push cantrip, you can do the cloud cantrip,” Ich-Mek told his friend in a reassuring tone. Rish smiled weakly back.

  The next spell he found of interest was an antidote spell. He recalled now that one if his masters had mentioned it; not for its own sake, but because the master had thought it reversible. Looking down at the page, he noticed there were tiny instructions written in the margins, including the word poison.

  “Why would someone use this?” he asked himself aloud.

  He then handed it to Rish to look at. It was obvious after a minute that Rish couldn’t make much sense out of the spell. Taking it back, Ich-Mek then began to consider it a candidate for his new spell-book. It would fit well, he thought, because in fact it was two spells in one; one for the curing of poison, and the reverse for poisoning. Not that he would ever do that to a person, he told himself.

  “Catch me a rat…a live one,” he told his friend.

  “Huh?”

  Ich-Mek waved his change of mind. “I’ll have Ont do it.”

  The next spell he found was labeled as a “reveal spell”. It looked almost the same as the cantrip for detecting magic, but more powerful, he suspected. This one he would add to his book, he decided.

  A shield spell caught his interest next; it was like the block cantrip, but clearly more powerful. Whereas the block cantrip could only stop small items, like a piece of chalk hurled at the caster, this one’s notes in the margin mentioned arrows and spears. He began to wonder now just how important the little notes on the side were.

  Looking to Rish, who was now studying the cloud cantrip scroll Ich-Mek had given him, he thought about why he would ever need a shield spell. Bandits maybe, he thought, but this seemed remote to him as only foolish bandits would dare attack a dragon-mage. It made him wonder what the probability was that he would ever leave the school.

  “We don’t know anything about the empire, or its enemies,” he told Rish as he looked to the book he had been reading.

  It was one of those that had been on the bookshelf when he was first placed in this cell. It was a book titled The Five Emperors, a book purportedly about the first five emperors of Ibu-Jek. Each section of the book had a written commentary by either an emperor or a closely associated official. Travels, battles, riots by peasants – all of these were detailed in the book.

  “Can you tell a peasant from a soldier?” Ich-Mek asked his friend as he went back to sorting scrolls.

  “My dad said he was a soldier once,” Rish replied. “He is kind of a peasant too…so…no, I guess.”

  “You’re not a peasant anymore!” Ich-Mek assured him with some strong nods of his head. “Tell your family that.”

  Rish smiled and looked like he would do just that. Ich-Mek then turned his attention back to the scrolls. He found an erase cantrip; this he added to his pile of scrolls to copy into his book. A restrain spell looked good to him; it looked capable of holding a person in place for a short time. It made his eyes wander down the corridor to where his guards were likely lingering.

  “Wonder if this would work on Ont,” he said softly, then quickly put his finger to his lips to prevent Rish from saying anything.

  He now had fourteen true spells and twenty-three cantrips assembled. It would be a spell-book larger than Tang’s. He looked around at the bottles of ink, and the stack of rice-paper, and concluded it just might be enough.

  “I’m going to be all night,” Ich-Mek said to his friend as he began to lay items out on his writing table.

  “Why do them all tonight, Mek?”

  “I can’t do them all tonight. But if there is one thing that Tang taught me, it’s not to rely on others.”

  Chapter 12

  The third day of instruction brought real progress with it, Ich-Mek was convinced. He had begun to alternate the class’s time between reading what the instructors had found for him, about Owesek-rings and mages, and teaching them simple rune-sets.

  However, this formula captured the attention of the Regent, who showed up toward the end of the day without warning. There were over twenty instructors in the room at the time, and all came swiftly to their feet and stood with heads bowed once the Regent was announced.

  Ich-Mek came to his feet as well, and when the Regent ordered in a pleasant tone for everyone to reseat themselves, he found himself the only one, beside the Regent, left standing.

  They glared at each other for a moment, then Ich-Mek decided he best sit down. As soon as he did so, the Regent began to pace the room, pausing for a moment here and there to admire the instructors’ work.

  “You endanger them too much, Fu-Si,” the Regent casually remarked, “but here in Key-Tar-Om that isn’t a concern.”

  Ich-Mek glared at the man again, and wondered what exactly the Regent meant by “endanger”. “I teach safely, my lord,” he replied.

  “Ah, but not a safe subject,” the Regent replied in a condescending tone. “You’ll have them chased, Fu-Si. Just as soon as they reach the next province.”

  Ich-Mek watched a shudder run through the instructors before him. Glances were exchanged, and nervous fidgeting began. Some of the instructors looked outright frightened now.

  “I don’t teach anything new, my lord,” he said defensively. “Nothing the governors of the provinces don’t support.”

  The Regent shook his head sadly at him as he walked up to the front of the class. Then he turned to do the same to the instructors. Some looked like they wanted to bolt now.

  “Your knowledge is pure, Fu-Si. Theirs is not!” The Regent placed his hand on Ich-Mek’s shoulder as he said this. “You are…inexperienced, and should be forgiven for not knowing all the ways of the seven paths.”

  Ich-Mek very much wanted to remind the Regent that there were far more than seven paths, but knew better. “Have I broken any rules, my lord? I thought you wanted me to teach.”

  “Paths are not rules, Fu-Si. What you teach is neither forbidden nor wise. Those who will leave this school should not have this in their head.” The Regent then gestured to the rune-sets Ich-Mek had drawn on the slate-board.

&
nbsp; Ich-Mek was silent for a while. Thinking now that he was in danger of losing his scholars, he then recalled what he had done for the Regent just days before. Whatever potion or enchantment the Regent and Master Ing had been working on he still didn’t know, but that surely was just as dangerous as the knowledge he was teaching the people in this room.

  “Should I stop all my teachings, my lord?” he asked in a flat tone. “Would it be best if I assisted no one?” He dared to look up at the Regent as he said this, to make it absolutely clear he was including the man himself.

  “No, Fu-Si,” the Regent replied as he withdrew his hand, and began to pace again. “Those who wish to remain forever…here at Key-Tar-Om School…or are willing to risk the wrath of things unmentionable…are welcome to learn what you teach.”

  Ich-Mek stared down at the notes he had taken, and tried hard to correlate what the Regent had just hinted at with what he and the instructors had gleaned from the texts so far. He couldn’t, not for sure, anyway. He couldn’t think of anything more to say in his defense.

  “Continue your teachings, Fu-Si,” the Regent said absently as he walked out the door.

  __________________________

  The next class saw only six instructors show up. They were all young, and among the most eager to learn what Ich-Mek taught. They worked hard to read through more of the texts, and each time something about the Owesek was found, Ich-Mek would make notes on it.

  They didn’t discuss what the Regent had mentioned the day before. It was like some silent conspiracy amongst them all, the meaning of which was too painful to face as it meant giving up the promise of deeper arcane-knowledge.

  Before dusk, Ich-Mek returned to his cell like he always did, and began pondering his future again. Without a better understanding of his ring and the Owesek in general, he felt like he was setting himself up for a disaster. Looking at the spell-book that was now nearly half-finished, he decided he needed another source of wisdom.

  “I need to talk to Tang and Bose,” he dared to whisper to Rish, who was currently sitting up against the bars of the cell.

  Rish frowned at him, then asked, “How, when Ont won’t let you go near the cave, not even the cliff?”

  This was true, he knew. Ont wouldn’t let him near the north gate, nor any of the walls that bordered much of Key-Tar-Om School. And he knew of no way to sneak by his guards, even if he had known how to open the gate of his cell, which he didn’t; even with his ring, simple cantrips had no effect on the lock.

  He decided to return to the library early the next morning, rather than teach his class. This time he came prepared to find things other than texts on the Owesek. Armed with a reveal spell, a locate spell, and magic detection spells he was determined to see what the library really had to offer. Specifically, he was looking for spells.

  He began stalking the aisles as he concentrated on arcane-script images. Eventually he started climbing the shelves to look for them. Hours of searching yielded nearly twenty opportunities. These texts he took back to the table to examine.

  He found his first spell written entirely in the margins of a page of a book. It was a read spell, one he had a copy of already, but he was encouraged now, and so went on to the next text. Most contained only fragments of arcane-script to start, but then he began to uncover more spells, complete ones.

  He stopped looking when he thought he found the one he had been looking for. It was a disguise spell, which was fitting as it looked like the author of the scroll was trying to do just that – disguise the spell as part of the rest of the text. With this spell, he planned to escape from the library just long enough to speak with Tang.

  Ont couldn’t enter the library, nor could the other guards. There were no other doors out, and no windows, so he knew he would have to walk out somehow, without being noticed. The disguise spell looked to be able to do that. The notes in the margin mentioned that clothes as well as facial features could be altered when casting the spell.

  He decided on a simple plan: the larger tomes, and those scrolls high up near the ceiling, were too difficult for the librarian to reach, so he would call in assistants to do it, sometimes three or four of them. With a little luck, he felt he could walk out as one of them. Ont wasn’t likely to come looking for him until dusk, nor would the librarians.

  Sitting down at his table, he began memorizing the spell. It took him almost an hour to do so, as it was a complex one. Next he summoned the librarian by calling out loudly for Ont to find him. Pointing to a large tome on the top shelf of one of the aisle, he stood back and waited. Sure enough, the librarian called in two assistants to help. He then pointed out others, until the librarian became frustrated enough to call in more help.

  Standing alone now, with a large stack of useless texts, he then cast the disguise spell. He looked down to see that his robes had changed to the color and patterns he had concentrated on. Then he turned over a candle holder to look at his face in the shiny metal on the underside. He looked very different, he decided.

  He held his breath, which was stupid, he realized later, as he walked out past his guards. They said nothing as he walked on down the corridor.

  __________________________

  No one seemed to notice the low-level clerk that walked by the dormitories and then crawled through the rosebushes there after. At the cave he saw no one as he peeked in, which was due to it being mid-day, he assumed, as well as the fact most students had graduated and thus gone on to provincial posts. With several active glow spells, he made his way toward Tang’s ledge.

  Calling up he got no reply, until finally Bose answered, “Is that you, Ich?”

  “Yes!” Ich-Mek replied with a grin toward the darkness that was the ledge. “Let down the ladder…or I’ll use a jump spell,” he boasted

  Ich-Mek could hear muffled voices now, and guessed Tang and Bose were talking. “No ladder” came a grumpy reply from Tang.

  Pausing for a moment, Ich-Mek then found himself perplexed as to why the two weren’t cooperating. He had been dying to try the jump spell anyway, so decided to do it, if for no other reason than to show the two he was serious about talking with them. As the rush of arcane-energy flooded his mind and body, he crouched, then sprang.

  “Ahh!” he yelled absently when he nearly struck his head on the roof of the cave.

  “Wow!” Bose exclaimed before coming to embrace his friend. “Sorry about the ladder,” Bose whispered in his ear.

  Ich-Mek smiled and chuckled to let his friend know it wasn’t a problem. When Bose stepped back, Ich-Mek could see a silent Tang standing behind him. Tang, for some reason, did not appear very happy to see him.

  “Who are you?” Tang asked in a dry tone.

  “It’s me…oh…wait!” Ich-Mek replied as he recalled the fact he was still disguised, which made him wonder why Bose hadn’t been fooled by it.

  Concentrating hard, he was able to see the tingling threads of arcane-energy that surrounded him. These he carefully broke with energy from his Owesek-ring. It was just one more fact about the ring he had learned recently.

  Tang nodded his head in approval before growling, “Boy! Thought you had forgotten us.”

  “Sorry, I was…unable to come before now.”

  Tang nodded his head grudgingly. “Nice spell. You bring a copy?”

  “No,” Ich-Mek replied as he handed Bose the notes he had made on rice-paper. “I brought you this to look at. It’s what I’ve been able to find out about the Owesek, but I don’t have much time to talk to you.”

  Ich-Mek then sat down to wait for the two of them to read through the notes. It took them both some time, and at one point Tang asked for water, which Bose dutifully retrieved for him. Tang then requested Bose find some rice-wine, which he had obviously been drinking, but Bose shook his head, saying, “We’re out.”

  Tang ignored the response and went on reading the notes for many long minutes until he eventually he asked rudely, “Your friend the Regent has read these?”

&nbs
p; “No! And he isn’t my friend.”

  Tang looked at him skeptically. “What has he told you about leaving Key-Tar-Om?”

  “He says I’ll be in danger…die maybe. Not that he actually says this…he just hints at it. Mostly he just tells the others that if I train them too much they’ll be doomed to remain here.”

  “It’s true, Ich,” Bose volunteered suddenly.

  Tang nodded his head several times in agreement then asked, “And why do you think that is so, Ich?”

  “That’s why I’m here, Tang. I don’t know,” he said with a hint of anger in his voice, which he directed at both of them now as they seemed to be keeping a secret from him.

  “You’re just a boy,” Tang declared as he went back to reading the notes. “I know why they don’t leave…why I don’t leave…why Bose can’t leave.”

  Ich-Mek stared at him and then looked sympathetically at Bose before patiently waiting for Tang to say more. It was frightening to him now, the thought that there was truth to what the Regent had been saying.

  Ich-Mek worked up the nerve to finally ask, “Why can’t anyone leave?”

  “The Scarm will come! I’ve dreamed of this,” Tang exclaimed as he pointed to his head before staggering over to the ledge. “Something protects all of Key-Tar-Om…the tenth province. You’ve heard of this…yes?”

  “I’ve heard it called that,” Ich-Mek replied as he became concerned that the now swaying Tang might fall off the ledge.

  “And do you know why?”

  “No.”

  Tang seemed to smile to himself. “There is no governor of Key-Tar-Om, just a Regent. Compared to the other provinces it is a tiny little swath of land, right in the center of the empire.”