Living with Your Past Selves (Spell Weaver)

by Hiatt, Bill

  “I’m afraid not, Gwion. There is that pesky reincarnation to think about. You see, the best part about this spell is that it traps your soul in the cauldron. No reincarnation. No cozy Episcopalian heaven. No sipping apple juice with the old gang in Avalon. Whatever you might have expected after death won’t happen. Just one endless stretch in the cauldron, knowing you are trapped but having no way to escape.”

  I had steeled myself for death, but now the adrenalin numbness was wearing off, and I had not expected to be condemned to some kind of claustrophobic hell inside Ceridwen’s cauldron.

  I had never been so scared in any of my lives. I started to pull against the ropes, but they were thick and well tied, and I was exhausted anyway. Ceridwen laughed at my pathetic efforts.

  “Ah, not as brave as you thought? I knew it all along. You were a coward as Gwion Bach, you were a coward as Taliesin, hiding behind Arthur’s warriors and singing your songs, you were a coward more than once when I caught up with you in other lives. Crying, begging, pleading. I thought maybe this time would be different, but I guess not.”

  Abruptly someone nearby started cursing Ceridwen in fluent Italian. The tone was very different from what I was used to, but the voice had to be Carla’s. She was coming up rapidly, and I had been right about the magic. I could feel her power even through the frenzied outbursts of the altar.

  I wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or horrified. Carla seemed to have bounced back faster than I could have hoped. Except it wasn’t Carla. A possible danger in pulling oneself together after an awakening is that a past life personality stronger than your present life one might be in charge. There were a few days when I literally was Taliesin 1. He relinquished control in the end, but a more determined, less ethical past self might theoretically stay in control for a whole lifetime. The personality controlling Carla’s body at the moment was very strong from what little I could tell. On the other hand, it did seem to be listening to present-day Carla. I knew Italian well enough to know whoever Carla was at the moment was trying to defend me.

  If Carla was up and around, surely Vanora was about to pop up. From my admittedly limited view, it looked as if Ceridwen and two shifters were the only enemies around, though I knew there were a few more in the house. If I could get free, though, there might still be hope.

  Under normal circumstances, someone operating at Carla’s power level would have given Ceridwen pause, but unlike Ceridwen, the person controlling Carla hadn’t been steadily researching magic for hundreds of years. Whoever it was was not necessarily less powerful than Ceridwen, but definitely less skillful.

  Really, the battle was over before it began. Ceridwen raised her hand and cast what I realized with horror was the awakening spell.

  What had Vanora said? “I don’t think you could have survived a second shot of a spell that powerful.” Well, if I couldn’t, how was Carla going to do it?

  I screamed and thrashed, another pathetic display, but Carla hit the ground with a sickening thud, perhaps dead, perhaps just broken beyond repair. I almost passed out at that point. (Yeah, screaming and fainting, just the sort of things heroic deeds are made from.) However, I was dimly aware of Vanora starting to attack Ceridwen, and then realizing Carla’s plight and becoming distracting by it. Silence fell too quickly. At best Vanora was unconscious. At worst, she too was dead.

  “Is it time?” said Ceridwen in obvious impatience.

  “Two more minutes,” replied one of the shifters.

  “Well, I guess it wouldn’t due to rush. My, Gwion, you do have a surprising number of allies for someone trying to hide who he really is.”

  I was thinking that I could say the same about her, but I was too weak and overwhelmed now even to talk. What would be the point? What energy I had I focused on a little prayer for Carla. I wondered if I could still pray when my soul became trapped in the cauldron. If I could still think, perhaps. Ceridwen had implied I could. As much hell as that would be—certainly oblivion would be better—maybe it would somehow be worth it if I could still pray for Carla. My mind felt as if it were unraveling, but I didn’t care.

  Two minutes passed with uncomfortable rapidity, and Ceridwen raised the athame, ready to plunge it into my chest.

  “I’ll never get to say goodbye to my parents. They won’t even know I’m gone at first. They’ll think some shifter is me,” I thought to myself in what I was sure would be the last few moments of my life.

  However, I had made a number of miscalculations that night, and that was one of them.

  Much later, Gordy told me what had happened. Stan had come to, well sort of—as with Carla, the controlling personality in the body wasn’t really Stan at that moment, but current Stan seemed to have some input, again as with Carla. In any case, “Stan” convinced Gordy he was all right and that they both needed to defeat Ceridwen, which Gordy was more than happy to do. Both of them were relatively far away on the roof and effectively off Ceridwen’s radar. Stan had them sneak cautiously toward where Zom and White Hilt had fallen. Carla and Vanora inadvertently created the perfect distraction. There was not much cover on the roof, but it was dark, and Ceridwen’s attention had been pulled away at the very time she would have been most likely to see them. Then, at the point when Ceridwen was awaiting the precise moment to tear my heart out, they reached the swords. Stan grabbed White Hilt, and Gordy took Zom.

  All my focus had been on the blade ready to descend on me, but a battle cry in ancient Hebrew captured my attention, and Ceridwen’s. (You might think, wow, typical unrealistic villain move—why didn’t she finish you? Actually, though, just killing me wouldn’t serve her purpose. She needed to make sure whoever was attacking did not disrupt the ritual, or she would have to go through the whole process again in my next life.)

  Ceridwen darted away from me to intercept a new set of attackers, dropping the athame and picking up Carlos’s sword. I twisted my head as much as I could. I didn’t have the best view, but I could see Stan carrying a flaming White Hilt. Whoever he had been in the past included at least one person the sword chose to respect. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I sensed something else, a new power vibrating within the sword as well. Stan couldn’t do all the tricks I could with it, but at the end of the day, a flaming sword through a shifter’s heart does get the job done. Gordy took the other one down, and then both of them turned on Ceridwen.

  Stan was fighting without all the extra muscles, but there was something different, some new agility to his movements. He had been practicing with a sword, and he had been working out, but there was still something uncanny about the way he moved.

  Gordy on the other hand was not fully healed, just as Nurse Florence had said, and the combat with the shifter had not left him in good shape. He coughed, and a little blood came out. I didn’t think he could hold up too long if his lung wound had opened up again.

  Ceridwen seemed to have made a bad strategic choice by charging Stan and Gordy with a sword. Even with Gordy rapidly losing strength, she was no match for them with a blade, but with both of them on her, she could not retreat very easily. Then I realized what she was doing. With both shifters down, she needed to position herself to attract their attention and keep them from knocking over the cauldron or doing something else that would wreck the spell before it could even begin. The winds raged around her again, keeping Stan’s blows from connecting. Gordy hung back, confused and obviously forgetting he was holding a sword that could cut right through her defenses. I didn’t think I could yell loud enough to make myself understood.

  I searched quickly for Shar and Carlos. Both of them seemed conscious…barely. They wouldn’t yet be able to do much, and it probably wasn’t safe for Shar, only partially healed as he was, to try.

  I tried sending a message to Stan, but the odd state of his mind at the moment cut me off. I tried sending one to Gordy and realized that the blood loss was pulling him toward unconsciousness. He may have heard me, but he just swayed a little. Clearly, standing up was an effort.


  Pulling at my bonds was clearly not doing anything, so I tried singing to them. I didn’t have much music left in me, or much magic either, but I did feel the ropes begin to loosen. If only Stan and Gordy could keep the witch busy long enough, I might just be able to do it.

  But then the altar itself started resisting me. It wasn’t exactly sentient, but it wasn’t your typical inanimate object either. The dark magic for which it had been a tool over the millenniums had built up a mindless but formidable hunger within the stone, a hunger that would not be denied. It wanted my blood, it needed my blood, and it was going to get it one way or another. I could feel it fighting me, holding the ropes in place, needling me in the back with tiny stone slivers.

  Ceridwen had risen into the air, an astute move just in case Gordy came around enough to use Zom properly. She seemed to be inviting them to throw their swords at her, but neither fell for that ploy, and Zom, which would have made it through her defenses, Gordy probably wouldn’t be able to throw with enough force to do the job. At least Stan was feeding whichever past life persona was in charge of his body enough information that he stayed close to Gordy, in case Ceridwen tried to hit him with a spell. Once she was airborne, she did try more than once, but Stan reached over and touched Zom’s hilt, which seemed to be enough to ward him effectively.

  The altar continued to claw at me, so much that it tore through the back of my shirt in several places. The tears were tiny, but they were enough to let those stone splinters gouge me. I started bleeding from several tiny cuts, and I could feel the altar getting stronger, more aggressive, with each drop of blood that hit its stone surface.

  Knowing I could not use a direct mental connection with Stan, I sent my voice to him on the wind. “Stan, Gordy’s about to drop. Take Zom, and use it to destroy the cauldron.”

  The unfortunate part about using the wind like that is that someone else who is nearby and magically sensitive can also hear what you are saying. Ceridwen raised both cauldron and fire into the air in a single, elegant gesture. They soared until they were out of reach of any possible attack by Zom.

  “Stan, the altar!” I yelled through the wind. I doubted Ceridwen could lift such a massive stone slab as easily as a metal pot.

  She did, however, try. I felt the altar shudder, and I could swear it got a couple of inches off the ground. I looked up and could see Ceridwen’s face twisted with pain. She needed more power, but the only obvious source was the altar. It had plenty, but she seemed to have to touch it to tap that power, and that would mean descending to within reach of Zom.

  Stan tried to get Zom away from Gordy, but Gordy, confused and not much better than semi-conscious, did not let go. The real Stan could have gotten through to him more easily, but whoever was in charge at this point evidently didn’t know how to talk to him. Seeing the confusion, Ceridwen shot down toward the altar, clearly intending to power up and then levitate the thing out of reach.

  I might have stopped her if I had just been free, but what power I could muster was not nearly enough to beat the altar, and it kept getting stronger, using my own blood against me. By now I must have had a hundred cuts on my back, and the altar kept jabbing away, making more by the minute.

  “Ceridwen,” I croaked when she got close enough, “this damn altar is killing me.” She was certainly an odd person to appeal to, but she desperately needed me alive until she could cut out my heart herself. As horrified and exhausted as I was, I could still appreciate the irony.

  She could see I was right, but her solution was to drain the altar, taking all of its power into herself. As she pressed her palm against it, and become surrounded by its red non-light, I did indeed feel the jabbing and cutting beneath me begin to slow.

  Abruptly Stan loomed up with Zom in his hand. Ceridwen had strategically placed herself on the other side of the altar, so she could fly up out of the way if needed before he could get to her, but even if she had the strength, she couldn’t possibly raise the altar fast enough.

  Zom came crashing down on it with a dull thud and its signature green flash. On some level I had hoped that one blow would turn the whole altar instantly to dead stone, but it was too powerful for that. Just as Zom initially killed only the flames in one spot when it hit White Hilt, so on the altar the red glow faded out only in the immediate area where Zom had hit. Stan struck again and again and again, each time dulling a new piece of the altar. I felt it convulsing beneath me, but it did not give up. Indeed, my bonds grew tighter, until I feared the ropes would cut off circulation altogether.

  Ceridwen could see that if she kept draining the altar, she would only hasten Stan’s effort to kill it completely. Instead she rose slowly into the air, taking the altar with her. At least that was the plan, but every blow of Stan’s shattered her levitation spell and let the altar crash down into the roof, which would eventually collapse in that spot if the battle continued for very much longer.

  When it first crashed down, Stan deftly slit the bonds on my left hand and tossed me White Hilt. Using it left-handed was awkward, but that had been the only side Stan could reach, and in three quick, flaming strokes I had freed myself.

  Desperate from the steady sapping of its energy, both from Ceridwen and from Stan, the altar had tried to strengthen the ropes, but they were after all just ropes, and no match for a flaming sword, even backed by whatever force the altar was putting out. As I was about to jump off, however, the altar made one last, desperate attempt to stop me. Where it had been using mere splinters of rock, it thrust a dagger-sized chunk up into my back, piercing me between the ribs and causing blood to gush out. I managed to roll off the altar, but I knew the wound was serious—as if I hadn’t been in bad enough shape already.

  I expected to hit the ground awkwardly. Instead I found myself rising upward, drawn into the air by Ceridwen. I was so taken by surprise that I let go of White Hilt, making my situation even more dire. Below me Stan was doing his damnedest to finish off the altar, newly refueled by yet another dose of my blood, but it was now all too clear that he was moving too slowly, too worn down himself to really get the job done. He was unable to deliver the kind of forceful blows he had been accustomed to using without the increased muscle mass derived from his own sword. Worse, as he got sluggish, the altar began to regenerate its power faster than he could take it away. Eventually, it would run out of energy if it drank no more blood, but before then Stan looked as if he might drop. We seemed to be losing on all fronts.

  Ceridwen flew close to me, just far enough away to be out of range of my sword.

  “Well, Gwion, your friends are a more potent force than I gave them credit for. But it won’t matter. I don’t really need the altar for this spell—it was just insurance. Besides, it is stronger than even I understood. I think it will exhaust Stan despite his sword. Then perhaps it will drain his blood if he falls too near it and happens to lose his grip on that sword.

  “As for you, well, here is the athame, and there is the cauldron, very near to us. It would have been easier to do this on the ground, but I can just as easily cut your heart out from here—and this time none of your friends can intervene.”

  I saw that Ceridwen intended to cut out my heart by using her levitation skill on the athame. I could probably have beaten back that attack if I had still had White Hilt, though my mind was getting progressively fuzzier. Before long I would be less use than Gordy. If I intended to make a move, it had to be now.

  The weakness in Ceridwen’s position lay in the different objects she had to control separately. Focusing on one levitation would be okay, but levitating multiple objects—herself, the athame, the cauldron, me—and doing something different with each would drain her far more quickly than she realized. I was willing to bet she had seldom if ever actually done something like this, but I knew from the experience of sculpting White Hilt’s flame in multiple directions simultaneously just how taxing such concentration could be. It would be easy to err, easy to lose control. That’s why I pretended to be unabl
e to dodge when the athame flew toward me, that’s why I let it cut into my chest, dangerous as that was. Doing that kind of maneuver would require even more intense concentration from Ceridwen and make it even more difficult for her to control everything else. I could already tell that she had allowed the whirlwind shield to dissipate, believing herself safe from any conceivable attack.

  As soon as Ceridwen committed to trying to cut out my heart through telekinesis, I reached out with what little magic I had left, grabbed hold of the air current she was using to raise me, and propelled myself right at her, colliding with her as forcefully as I could. She tried to grab the handle of the athame and finish cutting out my heart—result driven to the very end—but I knocked her hand away and pulled out the athame, then turned it on her. I was probably too weak to drive the knife into her chest, and I knew it, so I struck at her arm instead, making a sizable gash and forcing her to divert part of her concentration to stopping the bleeding. She did manage to grab my right arm and keep me from attacking again with the dagger, but I managed to punch her in the face before she grabbed the other arm. She was amazingly strong, certainly stronger than I was in my current condition, but the blood loss would weaken her soon enough, and I kept struggling, so she had to keep part of her focus on me, which in turn slowed down her effort to stop her own bleeding.

  As we struggled, she lost control of the cauldron, which went crashing to the roof below, probably not breaking, but certainly spilling its precious potion. At this point she realized that she was not going to be able to complete her plan tonight; there would simply be no way to complete the cauldron preparations again, and I could tell from the look in her eyes she could not complete the process of binding my soul in the cauldron without whatever the fluid was.

  I was dimly aware of Stan below us hacking away at the altar. It was still regenerating, but much more slowly without a blood source, and he was using the hardness of his blade to actually knock chunks of it loose. Whoever was in charge of Stan’s body was every bit as determined as he could be. He might just beat the altar after all.