Dark Magic (2 page)

“Yet all serve me,” said Xenomenus softly. “Is that not so?”

“Indubitably,” said Lykander.

“Our loyalty is unquestioned,” said Cenobar, “but still . . . to free Anomius? Better had we slain him when we took him on the Shemme.”

“Then perhaps we should never take Fayne Keep,” said Lykander, “for surely Anomius is the only one may open the way to that place.”

Xenomenus clapped again. “I would hear this plan,” he declared. “The rebels wax stronger by the day, and I’d not waste one listening to your arguments. If Anomius can aid us, then surely you seven can bind him with such spells as must render him harmless. To me—to us!—at least.”

“I believe it may be done,” said Lykander.

“May I speak, my lord?” asked Cenobar, and when the Tyrant gestured his permission: “I agree that without Anomius the taking of Fayne Keep must be a long and bloody process; even that his aid must surely swiften the downfall of the rebels. But I am uncertain that path is the wiser—I fear that do we free Anomius, we unleash a greater evil.”

“Clouded auguries,” Lykander grumbled.

“Clouded, aye,” said Cenobar, “but ominous for all of that.”

“Then enlighten us,” said Xenomenus, “as to these auguries.”

“I cannot, Lord,” Cenobar admitted, scowling as Lykander chuckled behind his hand. “Only say that I fear the freeing of Anomius shall unleash some evil worse even than rebellion.”

“What evil is worse than such threat to me?” The Tyrant’s eyes flashed affront and Cenobar offered no response, merely ducked his head as Xenomenus motioned for Lykander to continue.

“My lord,” the fat man declared, pacing a step forward
as though to separate himself from his fellow sorcerers, “we know that Anomius has laid such cantrips about Fayne Keep as to render that hold virtually impregnable; also that it was his skill gave Kesham-vaj to the rebels. To take back the one, to breach the other, must cost us dear in time and lives, and for all the time it takes, so Sathoman must wax stronger. Even now hedge wizards flock to his aid . . .”

“Petty charlatans,” grunted Cenobar, “weak occultists of no real account.”

“Save in numbers,” Lykander returned, “and as time passes so their numbers grow.”

“Time!” Xenomenus barked. “Always we come back to time! To its lack, to its dwindling—I shall hear out Lykander. Cenobar, you others, be silent.”

Lykander smiled through his soiled beard, smoothed his grubby robe over the swell of his belly, and said, “You put it precisely, my lord: time is of the essence. Ere Sathoman can augment his strength we must strike against him—and our keenest weapon is Anomius. He knows Sathoman, knows the rebel’s ways, the intricacies of his mind; more, he knows what spells and cantrips remain in force. He set them and therefore can undo them. I say we must use him.”

Xenomenus hooked thumbs in silver-chased belt and asked, “Then why have you not? He is our prisoner and you are the Tyrant’s sorcerers—why have you not probed his mind for these secrets?”

The smug smile that had decorated Lykander’s face dissolved, replaced with a placatory turning of his lips. “He is unusually powerful, my lord. Indeed, against any one of us, singly, he should prove victorious.” He paused, preempting the question shaping on the Tyrant’s mouth. “Even acting in unison we may not safely extract that information. His skill is such that he has wound defenses about his own mind—do we attempt their destruction we must surely destroy his mind and all it holds. But”—again he stilled Xenomenus’s protest—“there is a way. Of that I am
convinced. Anomius is mightily ambitious, and already he has turned his coat against Sathoman, fleeing Kesham-vaj even in the hour of victory.”

“Aye.” Xenomenus interrupted now, furrows vertical between his eyes. “Why did he do that? And were there not two with him then? What became of them?”

“We know not,” said Lykander, “only that they were not wizards and seem to have escaped down the Shemme. I deem them of no account, my lord, and Anomius has refused to speak of them.”

“So,” Xenomenus murmured. “Do you then go on—tell me how Anomius may be safely used.”

“His loyalty is to himself,” Lykander said, “which is to say, he will serve whoever may promise him the most. At this moment that is you, Lord Tyrant. Offer him freedom and I believe he may be persuaded to our cause. We seven may bind him about with such cantrips as shall consume him should he renege, and thus he shall offer you no harm, but rather serve you in bringing down Sathoman ek’Hennem, the alternative—should he refuse—being execution.”

“This can be done?” asked Xenomenus. “You can bind him safely?”

“We seven together,” Lykander promised, “aye.”

The Tyrant looked to the others and one by one they nodded.

“And what should I promise him? Freedom alone cannot be sufficient, for what freedom I dare offer must be limited.”

“That is true,” Lykander agreed. “Perhaps a place among us?”

Xenomenus cocked his head, oiled ringlets falling black upon his shoulder, his eyes suspicious. “To become my man? When his bent for treachery is so well established?”

“Bound by our magicks,” Lykander reminded, “harmless, therefore. And once Sathoman is defeated and Fayne Keep reduced—well, then his usefulness is done . . .”

Now Xenomenus smiled. “And could you destroy him?”

“Aye, my lord. When he is no longer of use.”

Again the Tyrant looked to the rest, his gaze demanding confirmation, and again, one by one, they ducked their heads, murmuring agreement. Xenomenus nodded in turn and spun about, going to the balcony, where he stood staring out across the land, eastward. The sun moved toward its setting and across the broad width of the Yst, fog rose above the water, the walls of the river valley growing misted, the great forest beyond blurring as twilight approached. After a while he faced them again and spoke his decision.

“Offer him freedom. Tell him that his service shall be rewarded. Does he ask for wine—give it. Does he want jewels, or women, or boys—supply them. In return I’ll have his allegiance, for what that’s worth, and he shall join with you to bring down this Burash-damned rebel. But mark you! Bind him with such magicks as shall ensure my safety and that of all my line: I’d not unleash a viper in my palace! Nor, when his usefulness is spent, nurture it. Once his purpose is served, destroy him.”

“My lord is wise,” said Lykander, bowing as best his girth allowed. “It shall be done.”

“Better destroy him now,” muttered Cenobar.

“Better destroy Sathoman ek’Hennem,” returned the Tyrant coldly. “Better end this threat to Kandahar.”

Cenobar’s eyes hooded as Xenomenus nodded confirmation of his own decision, stepping aside as the Tyrant paced across the balcony to the glass doors, pausing the instant it took a servitor to open the portal He disappeared inside, leaving the seven warlocks to mutter among themselves, not hearing Cenobar as he turned to Rassuman and said, “I think we shall unleash a greater threat to Kandahar and all the world than Sathoman ek’Hennem offers.”

Lykander heard him and said, “How so? Secured by
our magic Anomius shall be no danger, and do we but use him to bring down ek’Hennem we are all of us favored in the Tyrant’s eyes.”

Cenobar offered no reply save a thin and doubting smile; the fat sorcerer beamed. “The Lord Tyrant has commanded us, my friends. Do we then prepare our cantrips and approach our prisoner.”

A
S
the Tyrant’s citadel surmounted Nhur-jabal with gold and purple and silver splendor so, nadir to its zenith, the Tyrant’s dungeons drove deep beneath, into the dull and miserable places of the city, catacombs of suffering. And deepest of all, where weight of rock dulled sound and spirits, the sheer impenetrability of the stone leeching hope, stood a door of ancient wood, set across with rusted metal, bolted and barred, and inscribed with sigils of dreadful strength. Beyond that door was a narrow staircase curving down into the utter gloom of a circular chamber, at its center a great round disc of solid steel, engraved, like the door and the walls of the place, with the symbols of magic. Beneath that disc was a vertical shaft carved into the stuff of the mountains, six times the height of a tall man, its walls sheer and smooth as ice, impossible to climb, and in that shaft lay Anomius.

The oubliette was lightless save for the brief moment every few days that moldered bread and stale water were lowered to the prisoner. The stone walls were damp, trickling puddles over the uneven floor, and nothing lived there, not spiders or rats or even those insects that customarily inhabit such dank, forgotten holes. They, at least, would have provided some diversion from the tedium that, to a sorcerer bereft of his powers, was far worse than mere physical imprisonment. Anomius had known cantrips were placed upon the dungeon, but not how strong they were: mighty enough that he was, in occult terms as much as physical, blind and deaf. He could work no magic here, bring no light to brighten the darkness,
nor send out his mind to hear—perhaps sway!—some nearby mortal; the pouch containing such artifacts as he used was taken from him, his quyvhal lost with all his wizardly powers. How long he had lain in the darkness he was not sure, though it seemed all summer must have passed. That he remained alive was small consolation, though it occurred to him that some reason beyond mere vengeance must exist for that, and he pondered on it when he was not contemplating his own revenge on those he deemed responsible for this indignity.

It was that cogitation that staved off complete madness, the wizened mage like some drunken dancer or acrobat precariously treading a rope stretched over the pit of insanity.

He thought, as he crouched in his blindness, of Calandryll and Bracht, his days filled with imagining of their destruction, cursing them softly, a litany of raw and pure hatred. He saw now how they had duped him, tempting him with seditious promises into freeing them and bringing them safe out of Kesham-vaj. How the Kern had tricked him into using his magic too close to Nhur-jabal, where the sorcerers loyal to the Tyrant must sense his powers and set an ambush. The Kern was more cunning than he had thought; and the Lyssian youth had been protected by that undefinable magic Anomius had sensed in him. The cursed boy did not even know how powerful he was! Oh, he wore that stone about his neck and that afforded him some defense, but not in itself sufficient to withstand the probing of so great a thaumaturge as Anomius. No, there was more—some greater power behind it—and in time Anomius intended to discover what that power was.

He wondered if they had succeeded in their quest. Perhaps escaped down the river to Kharasul, from thence to Gessyth and fabled Tezin-dar. Perhaps they had secured the grimoire Calandryll had used to bait his seduction. Anomius did not—could not—believe the book was a fiction. It must exist: else he was no
more than a dupe, and that was beyond contemplation. He was Anomius! The greatest warlock Kandahar had known, or ever should know, and he ground yellowed teeth in frustration as he promised himself awful revenge, and in the promise found hope.

He was not slain; he was fed, albeit poorly; therefore he was allowed his life for a reason. What?

He saw it as though bright sunlight pierced the blankness of the oubliette, and his cursing became mingled with laughter. Of course: Sathoman prevailed. The ploys and plans and plots he had hatched, the glamours he had left, the cantrips he had worked—all were successful. Sathoman held not just the Fayne, but all Anomius had promised. He was no longer a mere outlaw lord, but leader of one faction in true civil war, a valid threat to the Tyrant. And all Anomius had left behind could be undone only by him: that guaranteed his life.

Whenever such logic interrupted his vengeful musings his laughter overtook his cursing, rising in shrill crescendo so that above, where guards and turnkeys lived in light, men turned to one another, thinking that at last the prisoner had gone down into utter madness and sought to shutter their ears, hoping that soon the Tyrant would order the lunatic’s death.

They were, therefore, surprised when the seven sorcerers of the inner cabal came in solemn person to lift the magicks sealing the outer door and descended themselves into the gloomy crypt. There, they formed a circle around the lid of the oubliette and chanted words of such arcane power that the musty air itself seemed to hum, filling with the sweet almond scent of worked magic. A nervous argus was commanded to draw back the bolts holding the lid and, with two of his stouter fellows to aid him, to raise the disc. It came up slowly and thudded noisily over on its hinges, and as torchlight gleamed about the rim of the hole there came a single scornful chuckle from out of the shadows within. For all the stony chill of that
place, the gaolers felt sweat on brows and hands as they were ordered to lower down a rope and bring up the prisoner.

Anomius rose into the light like some pallid grub. Small and sallow when he had been dropped into the shaft, he now seemed shrunk in, his skin pale as uncooked pastry, stretched taut over the bones. His hair had fallen out, his scalp glistening sickly in the radiance of the flambeaux, and his soiled robe was ragged and befouled with the wastes of his near-starved body. Grimed hands hid eyes that seemed huge above his hollowed cheeks, and the watery blue malevolence they held as he squinted at the encircling wizards. He smiled and the turnkeys fell back in alarm behind the protection of the seven warlocks, whose chant grew louder, seven hands pointing in accusation at the crouched figure of the prisoner mage. The scent of almonds grew stronger, and Anomius chuckled and stroked the bulbous protrusion of his nose, and said hoarsely, “So you come at last. I’d have food and wine ere we speak.”

Even the sorcerers were startled by this confidence, for though he stood filthy and thin-ribbed before them he radiated a supreme self-assurance that belied his mendicant appearance.

It was Lykander who said, “First we’d ensure safety.”

Anomius shrugged, bony shoulders rising beside scrawny neck, but offered no protest or comment beyond another scornful chuckle as the fat mage ushered Cenobar and the one named Andrycus forward to set bracelets of dark metal about his sticklike wrists. They touched the joindures of the circles and white fire flashed briefly, sealing the ensorcelled manacles in place, Anomius wincing as he was burned. Then all seven joined again in the voicing of spells, the almond scent thickening, heady, then dispersing.