The Wiz Biz

by Rick Cook

  The way was lit by witch-fires of pale yellow enclosed in great massively carved lanterns, the light pouring out through the thin panels of alabaster or marble that formed their panes. The glow held an odd greenish tinge that gave an unhealthy pallor to everything it touched.

  Here and there a censer smoked, emitting heavy fumes that curled and ran along the floor like snakes. The incense was pungent with hints of cinnamon and sandalwood, heady with the fumes of poppies and the sharp chemical tang of ether. It was neither pleasant nor offensive, just strange. It did not quite hide the musty odor of time long passed in a place undisturbed and the faint sweetish hint of corruption that hung in the air.

  Worse than the incense to Shiara was the magic that closed around her as soon as she stepped over the threshold. It was as close and stifling as a heavy quilt on a hot summer’s day. It pressed against her flesh and blocked her nostrils until she wanted to gasp for breath. It twisted and moved around her in odd directions and peculiar angles. She felt that if she stared into the air long enough the magic would become visible. She did not want to contemplate what might follow.

  Shiara took one more step forward and did gasp. There on the floor of the chamber, like a flock of crows dropped in mid-flight, lay half a score of black-robed bodies, already decomposing in the strange atmosphere of the room. Obviously the League’s sorcerers had found a trap that guarded the treasure.

  In spite of the dead, Shiara’s gaze was drawn to the objects scattered around the room. Each sat on its own pedestal like exhibits in a museum—or pieces on a game board—and each of the ones Shiara could see was different. There was no obvious pattern or order to their placement, but Shiara did not doubt there was some subtle design there.

  “What lies within?” Cormac asked from just over the threshold.

  “Danger and magic,” Shiara told him. “Stay where you are for a moment.”

  On the nearest pier of blue-white marble sat a jeweled crown. The golden band was made to curl snakelike around the wearer’s brow. Gems covered its surface so thickly the gold would be scarce visible when it was worn. Blue sapphires, blood-red rubies, sea-green emeralds, and lustrous pink pearls ran in twisted bands across the gold. Over each temple sat a smoky yellow topaz, golden as the eye of a dragon. In the center of the forehead was a blue-white gem the likes of which Shiara had never seen. Over all of it flashes of substanceless flame licked and leaped, clear as the fire of burning alcohol. Truly this was a thing designed to adorn the brow of a mighty sorcerer.

  Awed, Shiara reached out to touch the crown. Reached and then drew back. Some sense warned her that to touch it would be fatal.

  “Cormac, come in,” she called, not taking her eye off the glittering prize on the podium. “Move carefully and on your life, touch nothing!”

  “Fortuna!” Cormac exclaimed when he saw the remains of the League’s expedition. “What happened to them?”

  “One of them touched something, I think. Help me search the room, but move carefully!”

  As Shiara and Cormac passed from pedestal to pedestal the extent of the trove became apparent. Each pedestal held an item of magician’s regalia. Here a great gold thumb ring with a strangely carved sardonyx cameo stood on a drape of leaf-green velvet. There a chest of scrolls stood open, each scroll bearing the name of the spell it recorded. Against one wall an elaborately embroidered robe, set with gems and so stiff with bullion it stood upright and ready to receive its wearer. Above another pedestal floated a pair of silken slippers decorated with pink-blushed pearls. There were flashing swords and black lacquered armor, chests of gold and heaps of jewels, amulets and talismans and silver-bound spell books galore. Every item reeked of powerful, subtle magic and ancient, ancient evil.

  “Fortuna!” Cormac called from the shadows at the far end of the huge wall. “Light, come look at this.”

  Shiara followed the sound of Cormac’s voice and gasped at what she saw. This was no mere treasure house or cenotaph. It was indeed the tomb of a mighty wizard!

  The body lay beneath a clear crystal bell on a dais of milk-white crystal. Beneath the white silk shroud broidered round with blood-red runes, the wizard’s husk was as incorrupt and composed as if he were only sleeping. Amon-Set had been a man of no more than average height, Shiara saw, with pale skin given only a semblance of color by the stark whiteness of the sheet. The tracery of blue veins patterned his flesh in a manner disturbingly like the scales of a venomous reptile. The hands crossed on his chest were as long and slender as the hands of an artist. His hair was dark and shiny as polished jet and his brows were thin and dark, elegant against his skin. His lashes were long and dark as well. Shiara did not care to contemplate what the eyes beneath them must have been like.

  “Back away from it!” she called to Cormac. “Do not get closer.”

  As Cormac edged off, Shiara approached. With shaking hands she passed her wand over the bier. Then she sighed and her shoulders slumped. Magic aplenty she found there, but not the smallest spark of life. Amon-Set was truly dead.

  “The scroll did not lie,” Cormac said awestruck. “There is treasure indeed here.”

  “The life’s work of one of the most powerful wizards that ever lived,” Shiara agreed grimly. “My Sun, can you imagine the havoc all this could wreak if it were loosed upon the World?”

  “Well,” said Cormac briskly, “that is what we are here to prevent, is it not?”

  Shiara nodded and passed her wand over the closest pedestal. Then she frowned and drew back. She moved to the next pedestal and repeated the pass. The expression on her face showed that what she found was no more to her liking.

  “Magic?” asked Cormac.

  “Aye. What is on these stands is protected by the spells around them and cannot be touched. I will have to unravel this maze before we dare move any of it.”

  Again and again, Shiara tested the pedestals, until at last she had tried each of them.

  “I see how it is now,” she said at last. “The spells protecting these things are all interlocked like jackstraws. If you move them at random than the whole mass comes down upon you.”

  “Jackstraws have a key,” Cormac pointed out “And so does this riddle. One of these objects is the key. It can be moved first and then the next and then the next.”

  “How long will it take you to sort out the pile then?”

  “Hours. Perhaps days. This is no simple puzzle and I dare not make a mistake.” Her eyes went to the bodies on the floor.

  “Should you summon more of the Mighty to help?”

  Shiara considered and then shook her head. “There is nothing others could do here that I could not. Involving others only means risking them as well.”

  Cormac shrugged acceptance and Shiara set to work on unravelling the puzzle. Three times she passed round the great gloomy chamber, testing each object.

  “It is no good,” she said at last. “All of the spells are interlinked and apparently none of them are the key.”

  “I thought you said there had to be a key.”

  “I thought so, but I can find no sign of one.”

  “Well, Light. Where does that leave us?”

  Shiara frowned and tapped the wand against her jaw. “I do not know. It seems beyond reason that all this exists merely as a death trap for the unwary. There must be a key. Else why not destroy everything in the beginning and be done with it?”

  “Malice?” Cormac suggested.

  “A poor motive for all this work. Those of Amon-Set’s skill seldom did things for such simple reasons.”

  “Well then?”

  “There is one alternative. Rather than remove all these objects we could destroy them here.”

  “Wouldn’t that scar the land?”

  “Most probably,” Shiara agreed. “It also means the loss of all the knowledge here. I do not want to do that unless I have to. But Cormac, we cannot allow what is here to fall to the wrong person. Even a hedge wizard could rise to bestride the World with what is in this pla
ce.”

  Cormac sighed. “Do as you think best, Light.”

  She nodded. “I think with the right spell I can destroy all of this at once.”

  “How do you propose to do that?”

  “Earth magic. The forces are finely balanced here. They can be upset with but little effort—well, little enough in terms of the results. I believe I can fashion a spell to turn the magic against itself and so unbalance the flow.”

  “Earth magics are hardly a specialty of the Mighty,” Cormac pointed out. “Earth magics are uncontrollable. But all we want is destruction. It should be an easy matter to take the top of this mountain off.”

  “And take us up with it?”

  “No. I will set the spell in motion through a counting demon. We will have time to get away.”

  Again Shiara knelt with her bag and set to work. She had nearly finished the spell when Cormac came over to her. He waited at a respectful distance until she paused.

  “You know, Light, I have been thinking.”

  “And?”

  “Well, curse my suspicious nature, but it occurs to me there may be more here than we see. We know that none of the visible things is the key to this pile of magical jackstraws, but did it occur to you that there might be something here that is not visible?”

  “Cormac, you are brilliant! Of course the final key would be hidden! Why did I not think of that?”

  “Because you’re an honest thief, lass,” Cormac grinned. “Now myself, I’m a bit of a rogue.”

  She leaned over and kissed him. “You are that.”

  He looked around the room. “Now if I were a master sorcerer with a secret to hide, where would I hide it?”

  “Someplace close, I think,” Shiara said, looking around the great room. “Either in this room or in a room off it.” She started toward one wall and then stopped. “Cormac, I want you to examine the room carefully for anything strange or unusual.”

  “In this place? Fortuna! But what will you be doing?”

  “I am going to finish my spell.” She bit her lower lip. “Even once we find the key we may not want to use it. And I wish to finish this business and be away quickly.”

  “As you will, Light.” He moved off.

  “And Cormac, touch nothing!”

  Again the grin. “Since it’s you who ask, Light.”

  While Cormac searched, Shiara concentrated on completing her spell. She forced herself to think only of the technical aspects, blocking out the unease that almost stifled her. Only when the spell was complete and primed and her counting demon duly instructed did she look up.

  “Have you found anything?” she called to Cormac across the gloomy expanse of the hall.

  “Nothing I care to think overmuch on,” he called, crossing the black-and-green floor. “The place is strangely proportioned, these pedestals seem strewn about at random and the pattern on this miserable floor makes my eyes ache.” He looked down at the patterned marble at his feet.

  “The floor,” Shiara said reflectively. “Yes.” She looked up. “There may be a message here.” She stepped back to the entrance and looked out over the elaborate pattern formed by the squares of marble that floored the hall.

  From the door the tiles made the floor seem to sweep away in a roller-coaster perspective, tilting and writhing off into the distance. There seemed to be no horizon line and no point of perspective save madness in the bizarre geometry of the tiles. And yet . . .

  “Cormac, walk out that way,” she said pointing toward one corner of the hall. The swordsman followed her pointing finger. “A little further. Now stop.” Inexorably the pattern seemed to pull him to the right. It was somehow wrong to move to the left at that point.

  “Now go left,” she commanded. Cormac dubiously obeyed. “Further left. No, don’t look down at the floor! Don’t close your eyes. Just keep to your left.” With his gaze locked at the shoulder level Cormac moved more to his left and off into the gloom.

  “Now what do you see?”

  “Nothing much,” Cormac called back. “I just bumped into a wall. Wait a moment, I seem to have company.”

  Shiara gasped.

  “Nay, lass, he’s not dangerous now. But I think you will enjoy this.”

  “Stay where you are.” Shiara moved away from the door and toward Cormac who was invisible in the gloom. “Talk to me. Anything, just so I can follow the sound of your voice.”

  “Well, it’s dark over here, darker than any other part of the room. And our friend isn’t much of a conversationalist.”

  “Fine,” said Shiara coming up to him. “Don’t look at that floor. It’s both a trap and a hiding place. It is designed to draw you away from this spot and perhaps ensnare you if you are so foolish as to watch the floor as you walk.”

  She nodded to Cormac’s silent companion. “I think that’s what happened to him.”

  Standing almost next to Cormac with his eyes fixed on the floor was a black-robed wizard. He was obviously alive but equally obviously caught fast in the grip of a spell. He could neither move nor talk but his eyes burned with venomous hatred as he looked at the floor.

  “Why it’s Jul-Akkan isn’t it?” Shiara said pleasantly. “I thought you might be along on this and of course you’re too old a fox to be caught by the death spells around the hoard. What did you do, wait outside while the others rushed to the pedestals?” She turned to Cormac. “Note him well, Cormac. Jul-Akkan is high in the Council of the League. Indeed he bid fair to become a master of all the League, were he able to rid himself of one or two of his more troublesome colleagues. Now here he is, caught like a fly in a honey bowl.”

  Cormac shifted and raised his sword for the killing stroke.

  “No,” Shiara commanded. “I don’t know what that would do to the spell and I doubt you could kill him so easily. No, best leave him while we attend to our main business.” She stooped to examine the wall behind Cormac. “Now let us see what is here.”

  A quick search of the wall revealed a thin narrow crack in the polished black stone of the wall. Carefully she ran her hand along it, feeling rather than seeing the uneven-ness that marked a panel in the otherwise solid stone.

  She knelt down and pressed her hand against the panel. “It is locked and enchanted, but not guarded, I think.”

  “Don’t bet your life on that, lass,” Cormac warned. “This fellow was tricky enough for ten wizards.”

  “I will venture nothing on the chance. I merely make the observation.” Shiara looked up at him from where she knelt. “You do not have to be here for this.”

  Cormac shook his head. “You may need me.” Then he laid his hand on hers. “Besides, a World without Light is not a World fit to live in.”

  “Thank you Cormac,” she squeezed his hand. “Now stand out of my light while I unravel this puzzle.”

  Again working partly by magic and partly with her picks and other tools, Shiara carefully pried the secrets from the lock. Cormac stood by nervously, fingering his sword hilt, his head turning this way and that as he searched for tangible manifestation of the danger he sensed here. Finally there was a click and the panel swung smoothly back.

  Behind the panel lay another smaller room lit with the same balefire glow as the great hall. It took only a single lantern to light it. The stink of incense and the reek of magic was fully as strong here as it was beyond. But there were fewer pedestals bearing treasures.

  “A puzzle within a puzzle,” Cormac said as he surveyed their latest find.

  Shiara pointed to a pier off to one side of the chamber. “There, I think.”

  Cautiously she approached and then sucked in her breath at what she saw.

  Laying atop the pedestal was a magician’s staff. But it was like no magician’s staff Shiara had ever seen. It was perhaps four feet long and as thick as her wrist, but it was not wood or even metal. Instead it was made of a crystalline substance that seemed to show flickers of an amethyst light deep within itself. Tiny crabbed characters ran inscribed in bands aro
und its surface, save for a space about a hand’s breadth wide near the top. There was no knob or finial on either end. It was more a scepter than a staff, she realized. A symbol of rule as well as a tool of magical power. The wizardess passed her wand over the pedestal and smiled at the result.

  “This is the key. If I neutralize the spell and move this, we can remove all else in this place.”

  “Be careful, Light.”

  “I will, my Sun.”

  Slowly and carefully Shiara began to unravel the spell binding the staff to the pedestal. She made a final sweeping gesture and the spell flickered and died.

  In spite of removing the spell and in spite of her urgent desire to finish this business, Shiara was reluctant to touch the evilly glinting object before her. She had handled such staffs of other wizards before, but there was something about this one that awed and dismayed her.

  Finally, she placed her hand upon it and felt the waves of magic flow through her. It seemed as if a dark and vastly deep space opened up around her, inhabited by huge shadow things that pressed close, whispering offers of power, the fulfillment of all dreams and the slaking of all lusts. She had but to wield the staff and . . .

  Quivering, Shiara fought the temptation. She lifted the staff and carried it across the chamber at arm’s length as if it were a poisonous serpent. The waves of magic beat stronger against her, calling to her more and more clearly. In a fit of panic Shiara tried to drop the staff and found she could not. Now it was the staff which was holding her.

  All too late, Shiara saw the deadly nature of the trap. The demon at the gate, the spells upon the common items were sufficient to ward off an ordinary thief or hedge magician. To penetrate those and unravel the maze of spells within the cavern and ultimately to possess the key would take someone truly skilled in magic. One of the Mighty, or a black-robe wizard of the League.

  The whole cavern and all the magics within it existed simply to sort the untalented or the incompetent from the powerful and to lure the powerful to the scepter. The scepter was the last and deadliest trap of them all.