by Al K. Line
"You wizard?" the troll asked.
"Yes, I am. I was sent by Mage Rikka, as I just said."
The troll scratched at a lumpy head, a loud noise like pebbles falling into a bucket the result. "No remember. But remember wizard wait in library. Ambassador Teppo cast spell, make remember. I get key."
It wandered off, still scratching the confused head. Weird.
A few minutes later the troll returned, unlocked the door to the library—I'd been there before, years ago—and with a gracious, and slow, wave of an arm the size of a small mountain I was invited to wait inside while it went off to see if Mage Teppo was available. I knew he would be—it isn't polite to ignore a visit from an enforcer of the home country's Head of Council.
What was with the spell though? Just so the troll would remember to let a wizard into the library?
While I waited, I took a little wander around the room, all old, red leather wingback chairs, thick rugs, wooden shelves lined with books, interesting items with suitably spooky accent lighting—the usual.
A nervousness tickled my mind, making me edgy and uncomfortable, like I was stood on a ghost and it would haunt me forever as payback for being so inconsiderate—I actually looked, just in case.
Something was seriously off, I just couldn't quite put my finger on it. No ghosts, no imps hiding ready to play a mean trick on me, no fae ready to attack me with razor sharp wings, no demons hiding under the rugs, or vampires peeking from behind the thick, already drawn drapes, but my tattoos were itching like crazy and my mind was less than clear, and not just because it had been a very long day.
Turning my attention to the books again, as my half-fried synapses tried to tell me something, I knew right away what the problem was. These weren't merely books for show, these were proper books, stuff that shouldn't be there, shouldn't be anywhere.
They practically screamed at me, the draw of the magic and information they contained was so strong.
We aren't big on books, any of the Hidden, as they are too easy to lose or get stolen or burned by accident, and for as long as I can remember everyone who has become involved in magic learns through a teacher, through trial and error and practice, perfecting their preferred art form through instruction and immersion in the Empty, hardly ever by burying their head in books. It's just not how we do things. Some information is too dangerous to risk it ever getting into the wrong hands.
What I found on the shelves made me shudder, and that was just the titles. Where the hell had he got them from? Did he even know what they were?—of course he did. Was he completely insane?—my guess was, yes. Some of the books were worth more than a country. Titles I'd heard whispered over the years, myth and legend, never seen. The knowledge contained so important, so powerful, that in the wrong hands it would blow our world wide open.
Forget my little "accident" of the morning, this was the real deal. The real way to expose us all. There would be no going back once such information got out.
The dark shelves were rammed full of arcane tomes I knew right away were immensely valuable as well as powerful. You could do anything with a collection like this. You could rule the Hidden and Regular world. You'd pay the ultimate price though—I could feel the madness seeping through my pores just being in the room with them. This was too much, this was insanity on a shelf.
As I pulled out title after title, I began to feel sick, as the promise of what they contained, and the way they leaked, was enough to make me almost lose control because of the magic I was exposed to.
Such things should never be written, certainly not be left in the Regular world. That's not how we do things. Yet here it all was, books I never knew existed, books I had assumed were long gone, some mere rumors, now here, on the shelves. And I'd been invited in and allowed to see them.
It was time to go. Teppo had wanted a wizard to see, and that meant he was trapped. He wanted us to know, so we could do something. No way was I getting out alive if I'd seen this and Ankine Luisi found out.
Wasting no time, I headed to the door, wanting to grab as many books as I could but knowing it was fruitless, and which ones anyway? It opened before I was halfway across the room and the troll-cum-butler turned sideways, ducked, and stepped into the room.
"You stay."
"Can't. I just remembered I have an appointment. Say sorry to the Ambassador, but I will call again."
"No. Stay." The troll put out a hand, as if I could move past it otherwise—it was wider than the door and a lot taller. A hand went to its head again and it thumped it hard, as if trying to remove something. I swear it actually frowned. Then it said, "Wizard do thing to head. Mistress say not let people in library. Now you in. Must stay."
This was bad.
Fight with a Mountain
Teppo had tried to get a warning out, but Ankine Luisi had extended her influence to the troll, which was unheard of. The books, it must have been the books. She was beyond a mere succubus. She was learning other skills, knowledge not meant to be hers. "Look, buddy, I don't want any trouble, but if you don't get out of my way..."
The sickness rose as my tattoos sprang to life, stabbing and tearing at my flesh like a thousand fish hooks in their haste to activate. My eyes turned from regular vision to black, with the familiar specks most wizards seem to end up getting when in the magic zone. Normal sight faded and the magical world snapped into focus like putting on a pair of mystical glasses. It's a weird world, this Hidden world. So much to see; so many layers.
Magic shone at me from all directions. The books were alive with Hidden secrets, practically bursting their bindings.
The troll stood out like a beacon of pure magic. Timeless, and as ancient as the world itself. A creature born of fire and heat and unknowable pressures as it was spat out into the world at the beginning, amid the rock and chaos. I could see pockets of pink crystals, layers of various rock types, all hard as granite, and the jewel-like striations of red minerals that sliced through its massive frame. Even fragments of diamond that glittered in the light like a dangerous Christmas tree.
As the books practically came alive with my presence, screaming to be opened, to be put to use, the troll took a step forward, and I could read it easily. I was an intruder, a thief, not to be trusted and never allowed to leave. It was the guardian of the room and I was the enemy. The poor thing was tainted, corrupted by whatever the Armenian had learned, then practiced on the creature.
There was no choice, it was the troll or me. And I like me.
Stepping back, almost tripping over a strange stuffed cat, then edging around a low table like it would make a difference, I put all my focus on the troll, looking with Hidden-entrenched eyes at the structure of the creature. I could feel the dense pockets of rock, ageless and as impenetrable as the center of the earth.
My eyes searched the patchwork of minerals in its construction. Layer upon layer of compressed rock containing the history of the world, stretching back to the beginning, enduring and everlasting through the ages. I noted the flashes of thought as they slowly traveled around the priceless quartz brain, the simple structure of the body, the minimal nerves that offered little more than a faint reassurance as it moved but never felt, certainly not any pain.
I vibrated, thrumming faster and faster, going deeper and getting sicker and sicker, searching for weak spots.
And I found one.
Right beneath the left arm was a chunk of brittle slate, and I pushed out my hands, channeled everything I could through my tattoos and my body, sucking magic from the Empty like a landed fish gasping for oxygen as I let magic build and build inside myself until it erupted from my hands in all its dark, freakish, close to unmanageable, silver-specked glory.
The force hit the troll hard and it stumbled backward against a priceless Balinese carving that splintered into kindling. It said nothing, merely grunted as it recovered its balance and moved toward me.
It was angry, but you wouldn't know it. The heavy features were as blank as always. Aga
in, I attacked the weak spot, summoning up magic that jeopardized my sanity and threatened to rip me apart as the intensity almost overwhelmed me, warning that soon it would leave me, and I would be a spent man, throwing up on the expensive rugs and a gibbering wreck for days.
Trolls are magic beings. Timeless. Pure magic. You never try to defeat them, you run. But I'm an idiot, and I couldn't get out the door, so rather than use magic to blast a window or a wall, I panicked and attacked what amounted to a boulder, but with fists. I was seriously regretting it.
The movable mountain took a step forward, and I pushed hard with all I had, air alive with the cries of demons and the damned that always clamored around a fracture in our world looking for a way through, a way out of their eternal torment.
Dark magic spewed from my mouth, my aching eyes and my hands tortured and raw with black pain, thick gobbets of manipulated Empty as concentrated as the primordial soup single-celled organisms once found themselves battling for survival in, to emerge into an uncaring world. I screamed as I broke through the boundaries of my limitations and the power became thick and with substance, became truth and power. Indefensible.
The troll stopped, slowly lifted an arm, and we both watched, mesmerized, as a piece fell off and clattered to the floor. Then another, and another, fracture lines cracking and spitting, steaming and popping like magma. Silence. A frozen statue of timelessness as it turned to nothing but inanimate rock as the energy lines that ran through its body returned to lifeless crystals and minerals.
An arm fell loudly to the floor, then another. Then large chunks rained down like a statue of ancient man overthrown by angry rebels, and tiny pebbles clattered down onto the growing mound of destruction, rolling away across thick rugs as lump by lump the proud creature, corrupted by an out of control true Hidden, broke apart, no longer the stoic member of an age-old race, now just my anger and my instinct to survive.
My magic use wasn't subtle, wasn't used to allow me to hide or shrink into the walls or become the air itself, it wouldn't work that way against a truly magical creature. I had to rely on something born of its own kind—brute force. Plus a little luck.
Soon there was nothing but a settling mound of rock. I watched as it turned to dust, then threw up.
My eyes bled black pain and silver tears, and my head felt as flat as a troll's sense of humor. Like my brain had been spread out thin and then all scooped up, neural pathways rearranged in no particular order.
I had to leave, so I crawled over the dust and shards of the troll, bits sticking to my greasy and magic-infused clothes. My hands were like claws, covered in sweat, veins popping, swollen and dark from the magic. Dust got up my nose, making me sneeze, but I kept going, knew I had to leave and warn Rikka. Warn anyone.
The air cleared a little as dust settled and magic receded. I scrambled over the last of the fractured troll, hands clutching wildly for purchase, getting nothing but sicker and then I was past, at the doorway.
Pushing on, not accepting it was over but wishing with all my heart it was, I recovered enough to get to my feet, fighting sickness, ordering it to wait, for this was far from over.
I wobbled, but remained upright. Gripped the door jamb, breathed deeply for a moment but coughed up something too nasty to look at, then pushed away with seized hands and muscles as tight as Kate's panties. I smiled to myself, knowing I wasn't totally lost, as a vision of her firm buttocks wrapped in pink underwear, cheeks wobbling like heavenly clouds, snapped me back to reality, gave me energy, meaning, a reason to go on. I felt strange, wondered why a perfect bottom would bolster me, but it was her, Kate, not just the bottom—although it is nice.
I staggered toward the front door, feeling like a robot in dire need of a tune-up, maybe a few new parts.
"Spark, what's going on?"
I turned to see Teppo Quimby coming down the wide stairs, gait awkward, clutching the banister like he would fall if he let go.
"You look worse than I feel," I said. He hardly looked alive at all. His face was ashen, cheeks terribly sunken. His hair was falling out in clumps, he couldn't stand upright properly, and there was so little flesh left on him that I was amazed he wasn't gnawing his own arm he must have been so hungry. An expensive suit hung off him like it was slung over a cross made of brittle sticks.
"Have you come to visit? How nice."
"Um, no, I was just leaving. See ya." I turned to the door. It opened.
Stood facing me, smiling and with her head angled quizzically to the side, was Ankine Luisi, complete with her days shopping.
"Hello," came a voice more beautiful than any sound I have ever heard in my entire life. "Won't you join us for a drink?" She glanced at Teppo on the stairs, then dismissed him.
The door closed behind her, although I didn't see her do it, or even notice as she moved into the hallway and I took a few steps back to maintain some distance.
"That would be... nice." I felt the sickness replaced with numbness, then a warmth that crept up from my crotch. My veins felt like liquid honey, sweet and delicious.
She smiled again, more charming than an angel, but as she took in the destruction at the entrance to the library there was a flash of anger before the divine creature turned her attention, her love, back to me.
My mind began to empty, all thoughts drifting away. Fluffy clouds, meaningless. I wanted her to own me, to be with this perfect creature for eternity. Nothing else mattered.
This was what I wanted, what I'd been searching for my entire pathetic life.
She would love me. She would care for me. She would soothe me when I cried in the dark.
She was an angel and I would be the luckiest man on earth.
I smiled. She smiled back.
Those eyes. Those pale, infinite green eyes.
I was in love. I was loved right back.
I was lost.
Almost.
Meeting the Armenian
Her eyes were beyond deep and beautiful, they offered the world. All there was. Pure beyond compare and what every man searched for, longed for, ached for and wept over. This was the answer to everything.
Every lonely hour, every desperate act of need, every foolish comment and action, every misdeed and dark thought, all was forgiven. All would be made better if she became the only one I loved.
I looked into her eyes, and fought.
Something changed as she saw the battle rage inside me, and anger rose. Real anger, deep and terrible, as infinite as her kind, and utterly without mercy.
Dark magic reared up once more, my body still thrumming like a well-tuned guitar, every muscle, every fiber of my being taut and primed even though the sickness was unbearable as the honey turned sour and the sugar turned to acrid bile.
My body battled against the deception the only way it knew how. It let the sickness and the magic turn the nectar to poison. Now I was truly lost, despondent and alone—she was the only one that could save me.
I refused anyway. Better to be nothing than to be hers.
My manly resolve vanished for a moment, and I felt my body and mind collapse as all around me turned dark and terrible—a warning, her punishment if I refused to accept her gracious offer.
My humanity, something I hadn't even realized I was close to losing, saved me. I thought of Kate and how she would be alone. And of Grandma and how she needed me to watch over her as she was to go on a date with a mortuary technician seer. I thought of Intus and of Rikka, and even Dancer. How was his nub of a finger?
"No," I managed to moan.
"No? You do not say no to Ankine Luisi. Nobody says no to the Armenian." She reached for me with pale and slender fingers as delicate and pure as a sprite's spirit, so beautiful my heart ached and everything in the world felt ugly in comparison. And I rejected it.
With my hands still locked up as claws, I batted her away, felt the impossible surge of hunger, longing, lust and passion pass between us. Promises of wild abandon and naked delights no Regular man could refuse. But the
dark magic took over and I was so sick, so deep into the Hidden world, that her lies, her deception, her perversion of all that was pure and right in the world hit me like a flash of my own lost humanity.
I forced my mind to prise open my bent fingers, the severe cramp tearing at flesh and ligaments as the grip loosened, and I stared my fate in the eye defiantly as the angel's face twisted and spasmed, revealing a truth that would cause more innocent men to lose their minds.
Knowing I was almost lost forever, and with nothing to lose, I slammed my half open palm hard against my open mouth with such force my head whipped back. Locked fingers as hard as a troll's punch gouged deep lines across my cheeks and nose, and a tooth cracked as I took in the handful of troll dust still trapped in my contorted hand.
I swallowed.
To say it was dry would be like saying I was happy to become Ankine Luisi's next lover.
The succubus took a step back, confused, horrified, and afraid. Her beauty was gone. She was a plain woman in a nice yellow dress as I felt the dust burn my insides like the fires of hell.
"Oi, you can't do that. Are you off your rocker?" The faery scowled at me, magical motes of dust gleaming silver and gold all around her as she pinged into existence and wagged a finger right in my ripped and bleeding face.
"I know," I said, seriously in need of water. I felt the troll dust sink down my throat like the rock it was, and felt troll essence, ancient and immutable, battle against my ordinary self, changing me.
This was pure Hidden magic I'd consumed. A crime, an unjustifiable act that was always punished. What I did was taboo. A Law, inviolate, and it hardened me. Not my body, or my mind, but my emotions, turning me into not quite troll, not quite human.
"What do you think you are—"
The faery stopped Ankine Luisi with a whispery wave of her tiny hand, Ankine's words frozen as the faery turned back to me crossly, arms folded across her tight green dress and an ample cleavage. "Did you just eat a troll? You did, didn't you? I can see it on your lips, you foul man. Ugh, why are you all so horrid?" She tutted, an actual tut, and pointed at Ankine Luisi. "And what is that doing here? You know succubi are dangerous. Who let it loose? Who let it stay? It isn't supposed to be here."