by Taki Drake
The golden path continued past that room into another toward the back of the building. This chamber was huge. This one was not filled with seats. Instead, there was a circle of fancy chairs, each on their own raised platform. Most of them were empty. Only three of them had beings seated there, and a fourth showed some signs of recent occupancy. Zhanna’s eyes were immediately drawn to the woman in the black chair. She was old, very old. Black hair, purple-blue eyes that seemed to glow on their own, blood red lips. A slight form inside a heavy cloak spoke to her age, but the intensity of her gaze spoke to her power. Some inner part of Zhanna yearned toward the woman. Power radiated off a dimly seen gray Nimbus that surrounded the back of her shoulders, her arthritic looking hands gently cradled a small glowing sphere. Zhanna just stared at the woman who stared just as intently back.
“Yes, yes, yes. Now that you have seen each other, the rest of us can get moving.”
Zhanna ripped her gaze away from the old woman by a tremendous force of will. Turning her attention to the new speaker, who had continued to talk, Zhanna managed to catch the end of his sentence, “Mazza, I’m sure you guys can do whatever talking you’re going to do or whatever later. What I want to know is if she going to cooperate?”
The speaker was not one of the three that were seated. He walked to the fourth seat that showed signs of his occupation as he continued to talk to the old crone. Settling himself casually into the huge chair, he stared challengingly at Zhanna. When she didn’t answer, he continued, “What are you going to do in exchange for help?”
Zhanna was astounded, staring stunned incomprehension at the man. Trying to make sense out of what he had said, she began to notice some aspects of his appearance. Broad-shouldered and tall, he had an overwhelming presence. He wore a garment similar to what the men in her village wore as mercenaries, but his was in dark colors and with a sinuous trail of complex images that wended their way from his right mid-shoulder across his chest and down to the hem of his left pant leg. He was swarthier in coloring than the woman, with dark skin that appeared weathered and worn. His hair seemed to be an interesting mixture of black shot with silver and white. Thick and fairly short, it had a slight curl that drooped over his forehead. He glistened a little, almost as if he had a slight scale to his skin. Zhanna couldn’t see this clearly because the light in the room was not strong. She probably would’ve continued to study him, but the rest of the occupants chose that moment to join the conversation.
“Roz, give the girl a chance to catch her breath. It looks like she does not know the faintest idea what you’re talking about, so how about if you give some explanation before you issue demanding questions.” The speaker was another man, smaller in form, yet with even a more powerful aura.
“Men! Obviously, someone is going to have to explain things to Zhanna, or we are going to be here forever.”
This fourth speaker was totally different than the others in the chamber. For one thing, she was beautiful. Secondly, she actually looked friendly. At this point, Zhanna was just pleased to see an even semi-friendly face although she wasn’t willing to trust anybody right now. To Zhanna’s appreciation, the woman continued.
“What Roz was asking about is if you are willing to repair what the death of the volkhvy broke. When they all died, witches all over Russia quit worshiping the gods of their traditions. This chaotic and rudderless milling around has caused problems all over your world and ours. What we want to know is if you are willing to try to fix this?”
Cautiously, Zhanna responded, “It is not that I am unwilling, but that I am trying to find someone to train me. Until I know what I can do, how can I make a promise to you? That would not be a fair or honorable act.”
“Khorosho! That is good! Finally, someone who speaks plainly and without deception. We can work with that. The first thing is that you need to learn to control your magic. Once you have control, acquiring powers is not difficult. We can send teachers to help you, but before we do, I want your promise that you will do what you can with the abilities that you develop to fix what is broken.” The air seemed saturated with a slight smell of ozone as the smaller man finished speaking. Zhanna noticed out of the corner of her eye that the other three listened respectfully as the smaller man spoke. She decided to be even more respectful than she had been, to this one, because if the other obviously powerful beings treated him with this much respect then there was far more to him than met the eye.
“Honored one, I can with a full heart promise that I will make every effort to repair what is broken. No matter what the level of my magic turns out to be, I will try this and do what I can. But what if I turn out not to have much magic?”
All four of the beings in the room roared with laughter. Laughing with the sound of delicate bells, the beautiful woman answered for all of them when she said, “Mazza and Roz know their own, so don’t worry about not having any magic, child. And Perun knows your relatives quite well. Magic you will have, power you will control. The question has always been if you had the honor to come to an agreement. And apparently, the answer is yes.”
The relief that Zhanna felt was immense. She noticed in surprise that her hands were shaking badly. Now if she could just figure out how to get out of the room and get home she could start making plans.
No sooner had she thought about getting out of the room then she felt the warmth of another body close to her. Glancing to her left, she saw the gentleman that had helped her on her first trip to the dream plane here. He was looking at her with concern, and asked, “What is draining you so badly, child? This did not occur the last time you were here. Are you wearing anything strange on your body in the physical world? Because something is draining all of your energy from you, something probably given to you recently by an enemy.”
Looking up at the smaller man in the large chair, the helpful gentleman said, “Perun, I need to get her back home. With your leave, I will do so.”
Perun gestured his agreement and said, “Ilia, go ahead. After all, you know how to take care of the family.”
Taking Zhanna firmly by the elbow, Ilia pulled her from the room and across the floor to the outside.
Chapter 6
Zhanna became aware of her surroundings in a rush of sensory input. Strange aches resonated throughout her bones, strumming her nerves like over-tightened balalaika strings. The intense rush of returning feeling was hard for her to process. It formed a wall of information that filtered out other senses and other concerns. It was only a few seconds, but it felt like an eternity before she realized that the sound she heard was her grandmother calling her name and sobbing. Assembling her scattered wits, Zhanna forced her eyes open.
Her grandmother was bent over Zhanna’s body, clutching her shoulders and calling her name. Tears ran down the old woman’s face and dropped onto Zhanna’s soaked shirt. The naked grief in her Baba’s face was more than Zhanna could tolerate. The need to comfort forced sound out of a dry and aching throat. “Baba, please don’t cry.”
At the sound of the younger woman’s voice, Bolormaa let out a small shriek and threw her body over her granddaughter’s, clutching the younger woman convulsively to her chest.
“Slava Bogu! Thanks be to God! You are back!! Don’t you ever frighten me like that again!”
<
Feeling slightly more alert, Zhanna decided it was time for her to sit up. The effort was almost more than she could manage, which surprised her terribly. For a fit and active woman to be this exhausted and feeble was unusual. She felt like all of her bones and muscles had become aged, fragile and ea
sily broken. It was unpleasant, to say the least.
Before Zhanna could ask any questions or offer any explanations, an area to her left shimmered briefly, and Petra appeared. Absence had not improved the creature’s appearance. Bolormaa shrieked in surprise and tried to intersperse her body between Petra and Zhanna. Dascha, who had seen Petra’s defense of her witch during the battle at Kalisov, was calmer, although the sudden puff of standing fur was an indicator of just how startled the familiar had been.
Before things could escalate any further, Zhanna laid a hand on her grandmother and addressed Petra. “Thank you so much for your help at the village, Petra. I would have had a lot of problems trying to get out of there without you.”
Petra responded, “Promised the man that I would watch over the child. The danger was passed, sorry. More danger approaches.”
Shrugging off the appearance of a strange creature that apparently had been involved in her granddaughter’s life without her knowledge, Bolormaa latched on to the important part of Petra’s speech. “What danger?”
Petra directly addressed the older which, “Drain killing girl, Petra promised to protect. Man not happy with Petra. Not good to anger man. Need to fix and Mala to help.”
Bolormaa half rose from her chair, “What did you call me? Where did you hear that name?”
Petra performed a complicated little shrug of her shoulders and answered, “Man says hi, need to fix girl, soon.”
“We will come back to talk about this.”
Petra’s only response was a wide smile which turned serious as her gaze shifted to Zhanna.
Hoping to postpone whatever complication was growing between her grandmother and Petra, Zhanna tried to explain the strange draining that she was feeling in the astral plane. She also added that she was still exhausted, tired, and achy now that she had wakened.
Bolormaa excused herself and left the room, returning just a few moments later with a fabric-wrapped bundle in her hands. Sitting down next to Zhanna’s bed, Bolormaa carefully unwrapped the glass bowl that Zhanna had seen the previous day. Ceremoniously, Bolormaa pulled a small stoppered crystal bottle from inside her garments, carefully worked the stopper out, and poured a small amount of the liquid into the bowl.
Zhanna knew that tiny amount of liquid wasn’t enough to fill the bowl. She watched in amazement as her Baba picked the bowl up and started to move it in a swirling pattern. The gesture was old and well-practiced that much was obvious. Bolormaa did it with the ease and comfortable performance that only something that has been done thousands of times can produce. Once the tablespoon of liquid had somehow grown into a big enough pool to fill the bowl, the pattern of Bolormaa’s swirling change.
The Seer gazed intently into the bowl. After only a few seconds, she cried out in horror, and her face blanched white. Carefully, gently, Bolormaa placed the scoring bowl on the small table that was next to Zhanna’s bed. Only when she had taken care of the bowl did she turned her granddaughter and say, “It’s the belt. You have to take the belt off.”
Zhanna startlement was easy to see. Rushing, tumbling words spilled out of her mouth.
“But this is Igor’s last gift to me. How can it be something evil?. Are you sure that it’s this belt that’s a problem?
“I have seen the making of this belt. The leather, it is human. The stones and designs they are made to drain you and eventually kill you. I have also seen that this was not the original gift from your brother. It was Krava’s sick and evil plan to drain your energy for his own. He pulled out the beautiful metal belt your brother had bought for you and substituted this disgusting, perverted item.”
Dascha let out a hiss like an outraged teakettle. <
Petra put her contribution in, “Girl has to cut it herself, no one else can do so.”
Zhanna was both frightened and confused, she could feel her energy being pulled out of her piece by little piece. There didn’t seem to be a way of stopping it, no method to plug the drain. Now she knew why she had been slightly uneasy putting the belt on. It had not been from her brother. At some level, she must have known that it was from Krava rather than Igor. Knowing that now at a more conscious level, her skin crawled, and nausea pushed bile up in her throat.
She grabbed the belt buckle and flipped it open, flinging the belt across the room to smash into the wall. Immediately, she felt a lessening of the pull. The relief of that change allowed her to take a deep breath and try to bring her intellect in on the decision rather than just react like a wounded animal.
With a lower energy drain, some of the urgency was reduced. The women took stock and quickly discussed options. All but Zhanna were in agreement that the connection would be best severed on the astral plane. Although Zhanna was frightened to return there, the others were all convinced and had persuaded her of the necessity of this step.
<<<>>>
Once again, there was very little perceived time between closing her eyes to sleep and Zhanna’s emergence on the astral plane. Once again the young witch found herself at the crossroads.
However, this time she was not alone. Waiting for her there were two figures. One was the man that had helped her before, the man called Ilia. The other was the fascinating and frightening witch from the chamber of thrones. Seeing her this closely, Zhanna was even more surprised by the sense of power that radiated off the slender and unprepossessing woman.
All of that power was in her gaze as she firmly turned Zhanna around to examine something on her back left shoulder. Zhanna could not see what they were looking at because the location was an awkward one for viewing.
<
The comfort of her companion's dry tone let Zhanna stand a little straighter, little taller before she turned slightly to meet the gaze of what could only be an extremely powerful witch.
An unfamiliar spirit voice resounded in Zhanna’s head, carrying echoes of birth cries and screams of the dying in its undertones. <
Looking directly into Zhanna’s eyes with the laserlike attention of a raptor, the crone continued audibly, “You have a decision to make, little witch. One that every witch makes every time a spell is cast, whether they acknowledge it or now. Are you willing to pay the price to complete the spell? Are you willing to sacrifice what is necessary to bring that spell to fruition?”
There was no condemnation, no expectation in the elder’s eyes. Zhanna realized that this is a real question, one that she had a myriad of responses for and every one of them would’ve been listened to at this moment, by this woman.
“I understand that there will be a cost. But the anathema of a drain of my abilities and energy, something against my will and without my understanding, should not be allowed to exist unchallenged. Since it is a threat that only I can answer, then I am the only one who should pay the price.”
“Whatever the price may be?”
“Yes. I will not have someone else paying the price for something of my need.”
The old woman turned to the man who had been silently watching and listening intently. A strange grimace disturbed the mask of the woman’s face. It took Zhanna a split second to realize that it was supposed to be a smile. It sat strangely on the woman’s face but looked like it was real, not assumed. There was even a slight chuckle in the old witch’s tone when she addressed the man directly, “Ilia, I definitely know my own. This one will not start with cantrips and easy spells. The needs of her honor drive her. Spells forged by that fire
are always difficult.”
Ilia smiled approvingly at Zhanna. He answered the older woman, “Mazza, which of the spirit daggers must she forge? Can it be the lesser?”
There was regret in the old woman’s voice when she answered, “No, Ilia. This type of spell is difficult since it must sever a bond. When it is cast against a bond built with such intense stores of pain and suffering, anything less than the greater spell will leave her open to reattachment.”
Ilia sighed in disappointment before turning to face Zhanna. “And that is the spell we need for you to learn. Take my hand and let us see how quickly you can learn the ritual to save your life.”