The Wizard King

by Julie Dean Smith

  Athaya teased him with a grin. “Really, Jaren. You ought to find yourself a dutiful wife to do things like that for you.”

  “I’ll keep my eyes open,” he replied with a smirk, and then sauntered along the banks of the creek, munching on a slab of bread and quickly winking out of sight behind the massive trunk of an oak tree.

  Once they had all finished eating, Athaya brushed a flurry of soft breadcrumbs from her skirt and settled into a comfortable cross-legged position on the blanket. “Start with the smallest crystal you have,” she said, motioning to the small leather pouch poised in Kale’s hands. “And make sure to hold it away from the shade so that the sunlight can hit it directly.”

  Athaya expelled a bubble of dry laughter at the instructions she had just given. A bit like telling the executioner exactly how to hold the ax.

  “I’m not going to try and resist the pain at first, so don’t worry if I grimace a bit in the beginning. I’ve never taken a very close look at a corbal before—not since my magic came, anyway—so I want to study it for a while. Get… ‘acquainted’ with it,” she added, conscious of how absurd that must sound to the others. Not only telling him how to hold the ax, she mused, but politely inquiring as to the blade’s construction and history of use.

  “That is wise,” Kale observed, surprisingly accepting of her strategy. “Knowing the true nature of your enemy is often the key to defeating him, not physical strength alone.”

  The feathery hairs at the nape of her neck bristled as Athaya lifted her finger and bade Kale to produce the first crystal. Her flesh prickled with sweat as she braced for the expected barrage of pain. With morbid fascination, she watched Kale slowly unwrap the crystal—a tiny one, no larger than an apple seed.

  She made no effort to repel the corbal’s small measure of power, allowing it to trickle over her freely. The gem was tiny enough to cause only mild discomfort even in daylight. The pain was an irritant, but not overly distracting—like the gentle ache of a tired muscle or the fading itch of a mosquito bite.

  Letting the rest of the world fade around her, Athaya reached out and embraced the corbal with her senses. Her touch was wary, like running a tentative finger across a blade to test its sharpness without cutting flesh. Despite its threat of pain, the crystal was quite beautiful. Sunlight danced across its myriad facets, dazzling her eyes with indigo beauty. Some of its edges were flat and shiny, like new glass, others were ridged and murky, like a chunk of ice clouded with dirt and leaf mold. Its purple shade shifted from light to dark with the crystal’s grain—sometimes sheer, other times opaque. It was as if Kale held a tiny mountain in his palm, she thought, with slopes and peaks and hidden caves, ripe for exploration.

  Just beneath the surface of her awareness, Athaya heard the restless murmur of the corbal’s voice like a babbling stream, endlessly bidding her to feel pain and to flee its menacing presence. But though she called it a ‘voice,’ the crystal did not commune with words, but spoke to her in the deeper, more inaccessible language of emotion and sensation.

  Athaya sucked in a breath and held it. Just like magic.

  When her power was newly born, Jaren had guided her through her inner paths—that labyrinthine chain of caverns whose hidden alcoves were home to all her spells—instructing her to discover her spells by sensation, like groping in the dark for a flintbox with which to light a lamp. Each spell was marked by runes etched on the canvas of her mind; runes that spoke in wordless whispers to the farthest recesses of her mind, telling her the nature of the magic they invoked. When she opened herself to the runes of a witchlight, they warmed her with the gentle heat of a candle’s flame; when she touched upon the spell of translocation, she was enveloped by feelings of security and flight.

  Likewise, the corbal flooded her with thoughts of pain and warned her away from its presence.

  Athaya expelled her breath slowly. If the corbal was, in essence, casting a spell of deception at her, then where was its magic coming from?

  She thought again of her paths, and then of the source that was the locus of all those twisting corridors—the inner spring from which all her magic flowed.

  Was it possible?

  Intrigued, and not a little unnerved, Athaya allowed her senses to drift deeper, determined to seek the treasures of this cavern without regard to the beasts that might be guarding it. But when her senses brushed against the center of the gem, she felt a sudden upsurge in its strength; the pain, slight as it was, came back to gnaw at her more diligently. The crystal’s voice grew louder, compelling her to surrender.

  Retreating slightly from the crystal’s core, Athaya stared in muted awe at the little gem. She saw her own face reflected in her enemy’s glittering slopes and realized that their natures were not so different as she first supposed. Just as the locus of her paths was the source of her magic, so was the core of the crystal’s facets the root of its own.

  Athaya chewed on her lip thoughtfully. A corbal crystal was not a living thing—not in any sense she knew of life—but it was still a thing of power. Was it so odd, then, to think that its power had a source as well?

  And what better way to block the crystal’s pain, she reasoned, than to dam it at its source?

  The crystal’s grip on her was weak—too weak to foul her concentration for the task that lay ahead. Breathing deep, Athaya focused both eyes and thoughts on the crystal’s heart. I feel nothing from you, she told it, scouring it with her gaze. Her voice was nonthreatening but resolute, as if disciplining a beloved but unruly child. You cannot harm me now. know your secrets and you have no power over me…

  Athaya repeated the litany over and over until it came unthinkingly, bubbling up from the depths of memory. To sharpen her focus, she pictured each word as her mind gave it silent voice, fixating on the shape of each letter, the sound of each syllable. Soon, she no longer felt the warmth of the sun on her hair, or the tickle of ants as they scurried across her ankles. All she knew were the words, pressed against the crystal’s heart like a blade.

  I feel nothing from you. You cannot harm me now. I know your secrets and you have no power over me…

  Not long after, the crystal’s power was engulfed and the voice was all but silent. A heady rush of triumph washed over her, but Athaya persisted in her efforts despite the powerful temptation to cry out. She couldn’t afford to let her victory distract her. A misstep might not matter with a tiny gem like this, but it would matter a great deal later on, when she met with larger stones.

  I feel nothing from you…

  The corbal’s pain was gone, negated by sheer force of will.

  Now she faced the second part of her task: to ease out of her intensely focused state enough to reenter the world around her. She had to divide her attentions in two, sustaining her battle with the crystal while she went back to the business of living, exerting conscious control over her own thoughts, words, and actions. Again, the similarities between this task and her first lessons with magic surprised her; dividing her attentions was remarkably like the dual sight she experienced when learning to cast spells within her paths. Until it became instinctive, her mind’s eye view of her paths was superimposed over her eyes’ view of the world—until the spell was cast and the image flickered away.

  Her reflexes were slow but controlled as she tore her eyes from the crystal, floating upward as if from the bottom of a pool. She discerned the details of her surroundings as clearly as before, but the creek seemed to flow more sluggishly, as if the water was thickened with honey, and the wind curled languidly through the pines, like an endless sigh.

  “I can do it,” she said. She articulated each word with infinite care, but they still came out slightly slurred. She lifted her hand—clumsily so, as if she had never used the limb before—and gestured to the leather pouch. “Try another crystal, Kale. One that’s slightly larger.”

  She felt her control waver when she spoke, and the crystal’s tiny voice tugged on her mind, growing louder and more insistent. But its urgings were
abruptly silenced as Kale wrapped it in wool and tucked it deep inside the pouch.

  Athaya did not move except to breathe, wishing to do nothing to shatter her precarious trancelike state. She braced herself for the next crystal, one whose voice would be louder and more demanding, and sent out continual streams of defiant thoughts, ready to aim them at the crystal’s heart.

  Kale unwrapped the second stone, but its power was quickly blunted against her psychic shield. Blunted, but not dispelled. It took mere seconds to realize that this would not be so easy a struggle; the crystal assaulted her with more strength than she expected, trying to shatter the walls of her resistance like her sealed magic had once tried to tear its way out of its prison.

  Soon, Athaya felt in danger of being swept away in the current of the corbal’s demands. Pain, pain, pain! it said in its language without words. Flee from the danger! Her brain tingled in response, on the verge of unconscious surrender. The corbal’s influences teemed over her like rainwater, working their way inside the tiny cracks in her resistance and tainting her concentration. She was a scant step away from caving in to its compulsion before her mind seized once more upon its task.

  I feel nothing from you. You cannot harm me now. I know your secrets and you have no power over me.

  Pain, pain, pain! Flee from the danger!

  She focused her glassy gaze on the crystal in Kale’s hand—confronting her enemy face-to-face, staring it down in a contest of wills. I feel nothing from you…

  The pain retreated from her onslaught, but Athaya felt her strength ebbing; she doubted she could sustain the battle much longer. Fat beads of sweat dribbled from her forehead, and she grew light-headed from both the heat and effort.

  “I’ve got it… I don’t feel—ow!” She flinched at the sharp pinch of pain, as if someone had just driven a thorn between her eyes. She had barely drawn her next breath before Kale stuffed the crystal back into the safety of its dark pouch and laced it tightly closed.

  “Are you all right?” Drianna asked, arms poised to catch Athaya should she topple over from exhaustion.

  “I think so,” Athaya glared at the pouch holding the crystal, thinking it pathetic that it took such labor to overcome such a tiny enemy. “I just lost my focus there at the end.”

  Once confident that she would not faint, Athaya staggered unsteadily to the creek and splashed a handful of cold water on her face to restore herself. Her limbs quivered with fatigue; the struggle had cost her more than she realized at the time.

  But the battle could be won, she reminded herself. And that was all that mattered.

  It was a success, but an admittedly small step in an arduous journey. The Sage had been perfecting this skill for over twenty years and she for roughly twenty minutes. And by Drianna’s own admission, the Sage could resist more than one crystal at a time—crystals undoubtedly larger than the little fragment she had just engaged in battle.

  You always said I was a quick learner, Master Hedric, she thought, as she scooped up another handful of water and slapped it on her cheeks. I hope you were right… for all our sakes.

  “Give me a minute to catch my breath, Kale,” she said over her shoulder, her determination refreshed as well as her body by the water dripping from her face and hair. She was not going to be bested by a tiny chip of purple rock. “And then let’s try again.”

  Chapter 6

  Durek Trelane, King of Caithe and Lord of the Isle of Sare—though most residents of that island would take great amusement at the latter claim—returned the ivory comb and pair of peach-colored ribbons to their place in the queen’s favorite willow basket and fixed an angry glare upon the bruised and battered guardsman standing before him. The interruption itself was bad enough; the reason for it considerably worse.

  Durek had ventured to her Majesty’s solar earlier that morning to find his son’s favorite playthings—Cecile had written that Mailen missed the cloth puppets and would his Majesty kindly send them?—and had somehow lingered until midday, brooding in solitude as he poked through Cecile’s abandoned ribbons and beads and scraps of half-finished needlework. He savored the fading scent of rosewater that clung to the queen’s possessions—as it had to the lady herself—like a delicate mist. The south-facing chamber was shrouded in gloom due to a soaking summer rain, making Durek peevish enough without the further aggravation of his captain’s news.

  When the mayor of Eriston had arrived a fortnight before, spinning a wild and disjointed tale of a house seized by wizards and begging for men to expunge them, Durek presumed the man either drunk or a lunatic. Parr’s report, however, confirmed that the mayor was neither.

  “Are you trying to tell me,” Durek said, his eyes narrowing a fraction more with every syllable, “that of the full squadron of well-armed and well-trained men I sent to expel those foul wizards from that man’s foul house, only three came back alive?” He slammed his palm down on the enameled surface of the queen’s table so hard that a ball of yellow twine toppled from the willow basket, rapidly unraveling as it rolled across the carpeted floor. “What sort of men are you training, Captain, that find it so difficult to lift a corbal crystal to the sun and watch these magicians fall prostrate to the ground?”

  Captain Parr shifted his injured arm in its sling and tried to suppress his anger, but could not hide the crimson flush that crept from the base of his neck to the tips of his ears. “The mayor is waiting in the corridor, sire, if you wish to confirm my report. And it wasn’t my men’s fault,” he added, with as much overt indignation as he dared display. “As I said, their crystals were all but useless.” The captain’s harshly sculpted features settled into a mystified frown—an expression he rarely had cause to exhibit.

  Beside him, the newly invested Archbishop of Delfarham was likewise mystified. He knew the captain bore bad news when he met him at the gates and accompanied him to the solar, but this? Jon Lukin was not a man to allow himself to be surprised by anything—and would never admit it even if he were—but Parr’s news clearly troubled him. His normally scornful eyes betrayed a rare measure of uncertainty, and he pulled absently at the collar of his cassock as if it had suddenly grown too stiff and chafed his throat.

  “The six Justices that accompanied your men—they had corbal crystals as well. Gems ritually blessed and sanctified for such work.”

  “Useless as well, your Grace. And the men just as dead.”

  Lukin blinked rapidly—as blatant a sign of shock as he permitted himself to reveal. To his own surprise, as well as that of his king, he could think of nothing at all to say.

  Durek fixed an unblinking stare upon his captain. “Tell me.”

  Parr’s owl-like eyes went dark with shame as he recounted the unpleasantly one-sided battle. “We thought to eliminate the wizards’ leader first, so we surrounded the mayor’s house early one morning and began to move in. But we didn’t surprise anyone,” he added bitterly. “They knew we were coming. Somehow.”

  “No doubt they were spying on you with those cursed globes of theirs,” Lukin supplied, his upper lip curling with disdain.

  The captain agreed with an eager nod, quick to accept the explanation. But even knowing the fight had been unfair, his face burned with humiliation at how thoroughly his men had been defeated. “They jumped us from behind, sire. I held up my dagger to one of them—it had a corbal in the hilt. There was plenty of light, but… the man just laughed at me. He laughed!” Parr winced, still mortified at the memory.

  “It was the same with all of us,” he went on. He labored to swallow, as if trying to force a poorly chewed piece of meat down his throat. “The wizards took advantage of our surprise to rob us of our weapons and then routed us with magic. They set traps for us, trying to force us all into one room—blocking one hall and then another with images of fire and demons and dogs with foaming mouths. I didn’t realize it was all a trick at first, but then I remembered how real those angels were in Kaiburn that day—the ones Father Aldus created to frighten us so that he cou
ld rescue Princess Athaya. I tried to get my men to follow me through the illusions, but most of them were too afraid. In the end, only three of us made it to safety. A few of the wizards chased us for a while… they could have killed us, but seemed content enough with this.” The captain’s eyes skimmed over his fractured arm, the soiled bandage wrapped tight about one thigh, and the vicious burns striping his throat and hands. Burns, Durek reflected, much like those that had scarred his father’s body after Athaya’s sorcerous assault. “They probably let us escape so we could tell you what had happened.”

  Durek studied his captain intensely. Parr had a mature grittiness about him that far exceeded his twenty-four years, and his injuries only added to the aura. He had learned much since inheriting the captaincy from Tyler Graylen, but he still hadn’t mastered the art of hiding his emotions; Durek could tell that he was deeply shaken by the attack.

  The king’s continued silence prompted the captain to continue. “Once the wizards stopped chasing us, I circled around the gardens in back of the house and watched the rest through a small window.” Parr shook his head, still reeling from what he had witnessed days before. “The leader didn’t even touch the men he had captured. He just told them that their heartbeats were slowing and at the count of ten would stop completely. The men all looked bewitched, sire—as if in a waking sleep. And when he reached the count of ten, the men clutched their chests and fell. Dead. It was like he told them it would happen and because they believed it… it did.”

  Deeply disturbed, Durek tightened his jaw and glanced to his archbishop, silently requesting his counsel.

  “It seems your sister has gone beyond simple heresy,” Lukin observed, less disturbed by the loss of the king’s men than by the loss of Eriston itself. “After denying it for years, she now reveals her true desire—to take Caithe for herself, and in time, your place on the throne.”