Reckoning (The Empyrean Chronicle)

by Siana, Patrick

  “Now,” said the wizard, “do whatever it was you did in the great hall to summon the magic, but envision a different spell than the one I have just used. And be careful. The spell I used was a rather weak one, designed to stun, but I have no desire to have its power turned on my books or shelves.” Ogden pointed at the wall behind his laboratory apparatus on the far side of the sizeable chamber that served as his study. “Direct it over there—the wall is warded against explosions and resistant to magic.”

  Elias turned back to Ogden. “No one has ever thought it strange that a Steward has a laboratory in his rooms and so many books?”

  Ogden shrugged his eyebrows. “It is well-known that I studied alchemy and history at university, and I have something of a reputation as an eccentric, though no one has expected me a wizard. Sometimes the best place to hide is plain sight. Now, no more stalling. Get to it.”

  “Just do what I did in the great hall.” Elias took a deep breath, leveled his blade at the wall, focused his will along its length and cried, “Feora!”

  The surface of the steel roiled with waves of energy. The hairs on Elias’s arm stood on end and he felt a faint tugging at the center of his chest. A jet of silver-blue flame lanced from the sword, issuing from the point of the single-edged blade, while tongues of pale flame licked along the entire length of the steel. The hilt of the sword pushed against his hands, like a prolonged recoil of a crossbow.

  After nigh a quarter-minute (which felt a good deal longer to Elias) the outpour of fire ceased, leaving a sooty scorch mark on an otherwise unharmed granite wall. Tongues of bluish flame continued to roll along the sword from guard to point. Elias turned to Ogden and brandished the blade, face flush with excitement. “It worked!”

  “I can see that. Now, put that thing away!” After Elias complied, Ogden mused aloud as he rubbed at his chin. “Yes, Yes, it would appear that my hunch is correct—the blade does not merely store the spell it absorbs, but rather raw magical energy which it can then convert to a different medium. More than that, the spell cast from the blade was more powerful that the one it absorbed, which means one of two things. One, that the blade’s enchantment serves also to magnify the magic it absorbs, or, two, that there is an energetic loop between you and the Dashin and you bolstered the effect with your own power.”

  “Which do you think it is?”

  “My guess is the second. When a wizard turns or reflects a spell back, a significant portion of the energy of the turned spell is consumed in the process. Never have I heard of a spell that can reflect another and magnify its power. Think of a rock that is thrown against the wall. It may bounce off but not with near as much force as the original throw, because much of the kinetic energy is transferred into the wall. Actually, in truth, reflecting a spell back at the caster is magic of the highest order, and only wizards of great skill can manage the task at all.”

  “Huh,” Elias mused. “Although, even you cannot guess at this blades origin, and it may function outside of the parameters of magic as we understand them.”

  “Point taken, but don’t sell yourself short. By whatever arcane science this weapon is ruled, you have awoken in it a power that has gone unutilized for perhaps centuries. God alone knows how long that thing sat in the treasury with no one guessing its true potential. I notice that you cast the same spell as you did the night you fought the assassins. Was it your intent?”

  “You told me to do what I did that night, so I did—I even used the same word.”

  “Yes, but did you consciously try to cast forth flame?”

  “No. I just repeated the process.”

  “Yet, you expected that would be the result?”

  Elias rolled the question around in his head. “I suppose...I’m not really sure.” He hung his head and sighed.

  Elias could feel Ogden’s eyes on him so he looked up. “What is it?”

  “Only that you remind me so much of him.”

  “My father?”

  “He was as hard on himself as are you. You must remember, son, that people tend to find true what they expect to find true. We create our lives with our expectations, fears, and hopes—even our very thoughts. Do you understand?”

  “Not really.”

  “You will, in time. It was Padraic who taught me that. He said it was a bit of philosophy he picked up from the Eurinthian. He was something of a student of Eurinthium, more so than my colleague I think.”

  “Maybe it was this sword that sparked his interest in Eurinthium.”

  “Perhaps. Here, come have a seat and a glass of wine. You’ve earned it.”

  As they settled into a couple of the over-sized chairs by the bookshelves and Ogden poured the wine, Elias had ample time to think about the wizard’s question. Elias took a pull of the dry red that Ogden usually kept at hand. “Maybe I do know what you mean. Shortly before my father died he told me that magic was limited only by the limits of the mind.”

  “That is what he and your mother believed. Go on.”

  “In our present experiment, my mind was limited to my small experience with magic and as such I expected that the result would be the same as before, so it was.”

  “Precisely!” Ogden said as he made an emphatic gesture with his hand, spilling wine onto his sleeve. “If a person goes into a situation expecting a particular outcome, he is apt to get it, even if that is only his perception and not the actual truth of the matter. This is why one must keep an open mind and not draw premature conclusions.”

  “Especially a wizard,” Elias replied.

  “Especially a wizard,” Ogden agreed and went to take a sip from his goblet, frowning when he realized it was empty.

  †

  Agnar Vundi felt like he had spent the majority of his days of late looking out windows. The black fear that he would wake one night to find southern steel at his throat or face public execution had faded into a persistent, torpid dread that he would never feel the bite of the Northern wind again but would spend the remainder of his days locked up in his gilded prison.

  “I don’t know why you insist on these visits,” Agnar said, turning from the window. “Not that they’re unwelcome, mind you. I have no one to talk to and most days yours is the only face I see. Yet, why do you bother?”

  “You’re the only person in the capital who is as bad at cards as I am,” Elias said as he shuffled a deck. “That and I like your stories.”

  “How about I tell you a story about a dream I had last night. I dreamt of the Iscarp Mountains—a monument to all creation and bigger than anything you’ve ever seen in these Southlands of yours. I dreamt of the halls of my fathers set around the hot springs that make the seat of my king a grassy oasis in a land burning with frost the better part of the year. I dreamt that a man, once an enemy, now a friend, let me return there.”

  In the streams of midday sun Elias thought that Agnar’s eyes appeared almost white, reflecting the light like a timber wolf’s in torch fire. “There’s little I’d like more than to see you free, but it is not in my power—yet.”

  Agnar left the window sill and sat across from Elias, resting an arm on the card table. “Your queen is satisfied of my innocence?”

  “She is, but the court is not. The council is not, at least not all of them.”

  “Why do you have a queen if she does not have any power?” Agnar sighed, for he knew this was an old conversation between them, but it was all he had.

  “Our government is situated differently than yours. The crown needs the support of the influential houses, and their coin. The government is in debt and has taken loans from some of the notable houses, their privately owned banks, and even foreign powers, chiefly through bank alliances or marriages to the leading houses of Galacia. The crown debt is first what attracted Eithne to your king’s trade proposal.”

  “I’ll never understand your world. All this talk of wealth and your precious silver and gold coins. In my world we make art with these metals because they are too soft for building or for st
urdier crafts. In Ittamar a man’s currency is his skill.”

  Elias started dealing the cards. “In some ways I’ll never understand this world either. Where I grew up we were largely self-sufficient on our farm and distillery, trading whiskey as often as coin for the goods we needed. Truth be told, your Ittamar seems better suited to me than life in Peidra. I have half a mind to return there with you. There’s only one problem though.”

  “And what’s that?” asked Agnar as he eyed Elias over the tops of his cards.

  “How can you make whiskey with no corn or grain?” Elias grinned as he drew a sliver flask from his coat.

  Agnar shook his head and laughed despite himself as he reached for the polished flask.

  Chapter 24

  Secret of the Dark Covenant

  “No.” Sarad glared balefully at the man before him. The acolyte had the gaunt features and dark coloring that distinguished the men of Aradur. “It’s Hal-i-ruk not Hali-ruk. The Lord of the Fallow Field is particular about invocations in his name, and he won’t grant power to those who cannot speak his tongue. Again.”

  He watched as the man’s features warbled beneath a screen of magic. Whereas before he looked on a man with skin dark as burnished copper, now he saw a well wrought facsimile of a barbarian of the northern wastes. Sarad made the man repeat the glamour and the accompanying gestures until he felt certain he could perform it adroitly.

  The glamour was paramount to the success of his plan. All his agents needed to have it mastered by midnight for he couldn’t very well cast it on all of them himself. He would need every last shred of power available to him. By the pact they had all made to join the Scarlet Hand the door to the fell powers had been opened to them, but sadly not all had the wit or tenacity to excel in the necromantic arts.

  “Would you like that I too should adopt the likeness of the ice-men, Master?” Talinus said as he alighted on the windowsill. “Imagine the fear a flying dwarf from Ittamar would strike into their hearts!”

  Sarad ignored the imp’s quip. “Leave me. I have preparations to make.” The imp sketched a mock bow and set off to go about whatever business imps had whilst free of their duties.

  He planned to take the palace by cover of night. Ogressa had been kind enough to furnish him with a score of standard Redshield uniforms and breastplates appropriated from the Lucerne armory to disguise his finest adepts. For his part, Oberon had arranged for a squad of the palace guard loyal to him—or, rather, to House Oberon coin—to be stationed at the postern gates with orders to admit a contingent of new recruits with no questions asked. Once they gained the palace his men would quickly dispatch the unprepared guard thus leaving the back gate and portcullis unmanned and open to the remainder of Sarad’s forces.

  Once his combined forces had gained the palace the more skilled of his arcanists would invoke their Ittamarian glamours whilst those dressed as the palace guard would maintain their disguise. Both groups would head directly for the royal wing and the heart of the palace. When the fighting began the genuine palace guard and the elite Whiteshields would find the Ittamar and their own men coming at them. Once the battle began in earnest and the entirety of the Galacian forces roused, the Galacian regulars would join the scene only to find a melee where palace guard were pitted against each other and savages alike. They wouldn’t know who to engage, and in the ensuing bedlam Sarad would gather his lieutenants and strike for the heart of Lucerne and take the queen.

  As plans went it had few flaws, save for the vexing Elias Duana and his allies.

  While the Sentinels were a mere shade of what they once were, the Scarlet Hand had never been stronger, for as the old magic of Galacia waned, the arcane chains that bound House Senestrati loosened, and their influence grew. He knew that Queen Eithne’s Steward, Ogden, was a Sentinel and a wizard of no mean power, for he read the old man’s aura with ease. Despite this, he feared not the Sentinel mastermind, for in his heart he knew the cogent threat was Elias Duana.

  Sarad, however, had formulated a plan to neutralize the marshal, or at the least delay him until it was too late. Once the palace fell he could deal with Duana at his leisure.

  With the Denar heirs out of the way Oberon would assume the throne as regent, though his reign would prove short lived. With the blood of the Denar women Sarad would enact the centuries awaited ritual that would break the curse that bound his masters’ power and barred them from Agian soil. With the ancient geas broken, House Senestrati would be free to once again exercise the power that they had brokered their souls for before their betrayal by House Denar. Even the wizard-king Mathias did not have the strength to utterly break their power and drive it from the world, so he bound it the only way his limited mind could conceive—by finding a counter to what he saw as an unnatural power, the magic of un-life, in his very own life force and that of his brethren. Mathias realized that House Denar’s power was no stronger than the Senestrati’s, though it was their equal and polar opposite, so he reasoned by binding them together they would negate each other. Thus was the Senestrati’s power ever neutralized by the Denar bloodline and the living magic bound to each of its descendants.

  Yet the Senestrati endured, slumbering away the long centuries in a state of arcane stasis, sending their spirits out to roam the earth, seeking out vessels to perform their will in exchange for their knowledge of the necromantic arts—vessels like Sarad, to whom they taught the darkest secret of all.

  There was no Lord of the Fallow Field, or a Devil by any other name. Hell was a simpletons concept, a fairy tale in reverse. No pit existed in the center of the world awaiting the damned, for Hell only existed in the minds of men, formed out of the ether by their very thoughts and fears. No, Hell was not a place, but a state of mind.

  From its very beginnings, the One Church was a construct of the dark brotherhood, for on the fear-energy of men did they feast and grow fat with power.

  That alone was the secret of the House Senestrati’s dark might, and now that House Denar had wilted and the nations of men had lost faith in the validity of their own souls and the power of their own consciousness they would be easy prey to their darker appetites.

  The world was ripe for the age of the necromancer, and it began when Galacia, the lynchpin of Agia, fell. Sarad Mirengi, Prelate of the Church of the One God, closed his eyes and smiled.

  Chapter 25

  Shadow’s Fall

  Talinus perched over the Marshal that irked his master so. He leaned close, silent as the breath of death, and examined his quarry. Duana’s features were less severe in sleep. With his penetrating eyes closed his countenance bore an almost childlike innocence and he appeared a good deal younger. At a distance Talinus had thought him in the prime of his life, but under closer scrutiny he judged that the Marshal had seen about five and twenty winters.

  He need only extend his arm and with a quick flick of his wrist open the Marshal’s throat with his razor talons. That, however, had not been why he’d come. Talinus fixed his crimson eyes on the oblivious mortal and wondered. Try as he might, he could not discern what was so special about the whelp. Oh, he liked Duana well enough—after all, he did strive to foil Sarad, which he found amusing—but he couldn’t reason out why his true masters willed that the Marshal be not only spared but encouraged to nettle Sarad.

  The lords of the Eldritch Circle were known to be a fickle bunch, but why take such interest in this particular mortal? Duana proved himself proficient with blade and wits alike, but his arcane powers had only just begun to bud, and likely wouldn’t mature for years. With the knowledge of magic being but a shade of what it once was, even at the summit of his skills he wouldn’t be able to hold a candle to his predecessors of yore. Worse yet, Duana seemed married to the folly of peculiar human ideals like honor, justice, and duty—definitely not the malleable clay most men would be in the hands of the Eldritch Lords. Still, if it was the will of the Circle, Talinus would see it done.

  Once he was free of Sarad he’d commune with the
Circle and then he’d have his answers.

  The imp leaned in, so close that he could see Duana’s eyes fluttering beneath their lids and feel the mortal’s breath on his brow. Talinus reached out with his senses and entered the Marshal’s mind planting a suggestion of dire alarm and fear. Wake, Elias of Duana. Wake!

  Elias exploded out of sleep with a cry on his lips and a sense of dread tearing through his mind. He perceived at the limits of his vision a shadowy form that skirted the ceiling. Fearing an imminent attack he threw himself out of bed and into a combat roll. He snatched his sword, which he kept at his bedside, as he tucked himself into the tumble. With a mighty two-handed swing he unburdened his blade of its scabbard and backed against the wall, surveying the ceiling. His eyes darted around the room scanning for danger.

  The attack didn’t come. Elias remembered to breathe and gasped as he drew in one deep breath after another. He didn’t know what instinct had roused him from his slumber, but something had been in his chambers, something that loved him not. In his survey his eyes passed the door and he cursed to discover it ajar. Something had snuck into his bedroom unseen and nearly killed him in his sleep. Whatever the identity of the shadowed thing that traversed ceilings, it was now at large in the palace. The guard must be warned as well as Ogden, for Elias was certain that the arcane had played a role in the encounter. This whole thing stank of the Hand.

  Elias dressed quickly, but he took the time to button his duster full to the neck for he did not doubt that he would need whatever protection the durable leather could provide. As he reached for his boots by his bedside he saw the flurry of papers that he had fallen asleep reading spread upon the floor, which he must have cast off when he leapt from bed.