Enchanter (Book 7) (24 page)

“Of course you can get
really
fancy with them,” Cormoran pointed out, “if you can manage a rudimentary anthropomorphic response matrix enchantment, you can even manage mental communication, allegedly.  There were two or three successful attempts at that, done with dogs and gurvani back during the High Magocracy period.”

“If you believe Honvar the Obscure’s propaganda,” snorted Dranus.  “His histories have always been considered highly suspect and more than a bit lurid, in Remere.  And the telepathic communication was never independently verified.”

“But it was noted elsewhere, in more credible works,” Taren pointed out, then grinned.  “That would be fun, wouldn’t it?  Actually having a magical tool that can talk back to you?”

“You couldn’t really get more than basic information back, could you?” Rael asked, skeptically.  “I’m sure these sea-creatures were fairly simple souls, without the sophistication to communicate more than a few rudimentary things.”

“I don’t know about that,” Dara countered.  “I get a lot of useful information from Frightful and other animals, and they’re no more or less primitive than those sea creatures.  Just dryer.”

“And you aren’t taking into account the possibility of augmenting the enneagram with chaptal spells,” Dranus observed, tactfully.  “The original is, I would guess, a complete pattern, but it could well serve as the foundation for a far more complex set of arcane augmentations, such as are used by adepts to give breadth to the elementals they conjure when they .  While such creations have, alas, been too ephemeral in most cases to warrant such an investment in most cases, it has been done.  With an essentially permanent enneagram, developmental enchantments to improve the sophistication of self-awareness could, theoretically, be added to the pattern.”

“Now that
is
an interesting thought,” agreed Cormoran.  “You said you have the means to make an enneagram permanent, Minalan?”

“Oh, yes,” Dara agreed.  “The Alaran Stone, one of the crystals from the mountain.  There’s a water elemental that’s been living in the millpond continuously for almost two years, now.  Of course, this is Sevendor,” she shrugged. 

“But that would allow you to stabilize the enneagram,” Cormoran reasoned, “more than enough to add augmentations for greater self-awareness and responsiveness.  What such enchantments would look like, I have no idea, but—”

“Got it!” I said, happily.  I’d finally found what I was looking for: a pattern of elegant sophistication and inquisitiveness, a highly-developed and very curious mind.  I’d encountered and rejected it last summer, as we were building constructs, because it just wasn’t bellicose enough.  Its hallmark was curiosity.

I know not what ancient creature had contributed it to the Grain, but it seemed like some sort of scavenger, some curious fish or crustacean or something altogether unimaginable, that spent the majority of the time searching.  For food, for predators, for mates, for shiny things (it liked shiny things), this enneagrammatic pattern seemed dedicated to finding things out. 

As an added bonus, I could see a clear string of tell-tale symbols within the enneagram associated with arcane power – whatever the creature had been, it had been able to use some kind of magic as part of its natural life cycle.  That could prove very useful.  Just the sort of spirit I wanted in my baculus. 

“Yes, this is the one I want.  If you will prepare the cadrans enchantment, Taren?”

We made the transfer without any trouble, using a plain, large quartz crystal for the bridewell.  Once the pattern was locked into the enneagrammatic harness enchantment (the
cadrans
) already painstakingly embedded in the staff, all it took was a simple thaumaturgical transfer.  Then came the process of entraining the pattern to the various elements of the staff and making the first few of the hundreds of thaumaturgic connections between the paraclete and the enchantments it would control with a tranchette, a special thaumaturgical wand. 

That was a much longer operose process, and I’d do most of it myself, later, but I did enough of the major elements to demonstrate how it was done, with Taren explaining the technique to the others over my shoulder.  In this case that meant tying it into the witchstone I installed at the head to power it.

Yes, that was an extravagance most enchanters couldn’t afford, but then I had an embarrassing treasury of the things at the moment and no war to fight.  Irionite in the baculus ensured an independent power source, and once I boun it to the enneagram’s long-dead awareness of its long-dead digestive system, the baculus began suckling power into the matrix of its own accord in a process known as bullition, the initial powering of an enchantment.  It began to “wake up.”

“The process takes a while,” Taren assured everyone.  “The constructs we used in battle this summer only used very basic metastatic motor pathways, but even they took a few hours to establish in the field.  Essentially, the pattern needs to realize that it exists and that it can act and react like a living thing, once again.  Depending on how intelligent the enneagram is, more than likely.”

“I still don’t see what the point of an intelligent stick is,” Rael dismissed.

“It can run spells for you,” I suggested.  “It takes will, desire, and awareness to enact any spell, and these patterns are more than sophisticated enough to do that.  If I want to take an etheric density reading, for instance, instead of reaching into the staff and using the enchantment hung there for that purpose, I can command my baculus to do that mental work for me instead.  It should return the results to me on its own, without me expending the energy, time, or attention.”

“Kind of like the way the Thoughtful Knife works,” Dara said, casually.  “There’s a definite self-awareness in the thing, but it’s primitive.  It only knows how to fly and how to kill.  And it sees killing as a component of eating, I think.  Or that’s how it feels.”

“Or you can direct a pattern by entraining with its natural processes,” I added.  “If you had a magical plow, for instance, by imbuing it with an enneagram from the Grain you could entrain its plowing action to the pattern’s desire for food.  Make it think that good, loose soil is sustenance, and it will run all day.”

“Though why you would go to all the trouble when you could use a plowing charm is beyond me,” Rael added, with a toss of her head.  “But I see your point.”

“In this case, this curious little fellow will soon have access to all of my diagnostic enchantments in the baculus,” I said, proudly.  “Once I get it entrained, connected and then trained, I expect it will be able to use them as easily as it did its many arms and legs.  Or whatever it had.  Some sort of antennae or vibrassa, I think,” I proposed.  “And eyes.  It had big eyes, once, a lot of them.  I’ll use that, right after I make the pattern permanent back at my shop.”

Over the next few days, those who desired a paracletic thaumaturgical baculus undertook the process of selection and enchantment, with mine and Taren’s guidance.  With only one or two small errors we built them for Dranus, Planus, Cormoran, Taren, Andalnam, Gareth, Lanse and Ulin.  Unlike my baculus, they had to do the empowerment of the rod with their own witchstones, and feed it power according to the needs of the paraclete. 

There was a decided change in the work we did after that.  Once one of us began using our individually imbued baculus to create our enchantments, the work got easier.  Not just easier, but more sophisticated and faster.  Depending upon the enneagram chosen, the ability of the specific rod was able to add to a mage’s powers significantly in the process of enchantment.  It was like suddenly giving us each an inspired thaumaturgical assistant who could cast our spells better and more quickly than we could.

We got better, very quickly.

*

*

A week before Yule I called a halt to our serious work and put the combined might of the group instead toward the creation of magical gifts for the season.  I had a large number of them to give myself –gifting is an essential part of the feudal economy, and I was on the hook for a pile of them.  Everyone from my vassals to my yeomen to my liege lords – and my allies, various temples and abbeys, and hundreds of individuals – were due gifts from me, if I wanted to maintain my social position.  The more expensive and elaborate the gift, the more honor to the giver.

This Yule I was going to pile up honor like snow in a blizzard.

It felt like cheating, in a lot of ways.  Most nobles would go into debt to buy each other expensive trinkets – but I took normal, ordinary trinkets and added a bit of enchantment and got off cheap. 

This was also an opportunity to surreptitiously use magic to cause some permanent change in the region, quietly.  My conversations with Ulin about the history of such changes had given me a lot of good ideas in that direction. 

For my present vassals it was a chance to grant them more power and security over their domains.  I currently had four titled lords and three tenant lords.  For each of the lords I gave a pillar of snowstone ten feet tall, with a snowglass at the peak, like the ones Taren had crafted for the pele towers of the Wilderlands.  These glowed with a green light at night, Sevendor Green, had a simple snowflake carved into the front, and were given in token of their continued allegiance.  The pillars contained other enchantments that would assist in defense and administration of the barony, but their most important function was to serve as a visible reminder that they were all under the protection and justice of the Spellmonger. 

For the three tenant lords I gave a bag full of snowstone marbles, each with the Cat’s Eye spell permanently enchanted on it.  Each pebble would allow their sentries to see in the dark without need of torches, a valuable advantage in any military.  For the four titled lords I gave more personal gifts: a matched set of plowing and mowing rods for use in their domains.  That was a risky proposition, but I wanted to experiment with two enchantments that I thought had the potential to fundamentally alter the agrarian economy of the Riverlands in my own lands, first. 

To my allies I sent even grander gifts: Baron Arathanial received not only a bag of Cat’s Eyes, but also a custom-made warstaff for the use of his new Court Wizard.  It was one of Carmella’s designs, a staff specifically enchanted for breaking walls and undermining towers.  It wouldn’t do much against mage-warded fortifications, of course, but against the castles of Sashtalia it would work wonders.  A simple gift, but one that could have important consequences for Arathanial’s planned war.

For the lord of Trestendor, my friend Sire Sigalan, my gifts were of a more practical nature.  His object wasn’t conquest, but administration, as he tried to restore his recaptured domains to prosperity after nearly a decade of despoilment under the Warbird.  Most of his villages were depopulated and poverty-stricken, now, not the prosperous estates they’d been in his father’s time.  It was a situation in which the plowing and mowing wands would be of particular importance, so I sent three pairs along with three wagons of seeds, saplings, and root stock that Master Olmeg thought might be well suited to the clay-heavy soils of his lands. 

In addition, I had a Mirror sent to my friend, one that connected directly to the regular attendant at the Mirror Array –sorry, the
Enoprtary
-- in the Chapterhouse.  If Trestendor needed Sevendor’s assistance, we could be notified instantly.  That provided my friend with a lot of security.

My Yeomen were happy with me this Yule – they all got magical chamberpots.  One of my easiest and most popular enchantments, they odorless contained the nightsoil in a hoxter until released by a command.  Sure, it was an extravagant use of a powerful enchantment for an utterly mundane purpose, but after using one for more than a year, I’d fight to keep it.  King Rard himself loved his, and knowing they were crapping like kings made all of my Yeoman smile.

In addition I purchased or enchanted individual gifts for each particular Yeomen and their households.  Jurlor received a magical butter churn, my brother-in-law Sagal and his wife Ela were given an icestone - like a heatstone, except, you know,
cold
– for their larder.  The Master of the Wood and Pass was given a glass which acted like magesight, magically magnifying objects at a distance.  From the new spire being built at the high pass next summer the Westwoodmen would be able to see anything on either side of the ridge.

To the folk of Brestal I granted the right to plant six of my fields in that village demesne that had not been used in generations, licenses for two taverns and an inn, and a grant to their Yeoman of one hundred ounces of silver with the requirement he reorganize and develop a proper High Street in the village. 

To the villeins of Gurisham I granted twenty of their leading families freemen status, and the coveted right to fish the millpond every feast day.  That would force them to renegotiate their agricultural obligations and fees with the castle and keep them from standing around the fields like scarecrows in fulfillment of their duties.  I threw in a license for a public house, to be overseen by the Yeomen, to keep them happy, too.  I like taverns, and the long stretch between Boval Village and Sevendor Town needed one like Gareth needed rugged good looks.

I had Master Olmeg’s gift especially selected from my summer march with the Kasari.  While walking through the great Redwood Forest in Bransei, I had discussed the lore of the trees enough with the loremasters of that great wood to select several cones to bring home for my Greenwarden.  I’m not certain the Kasari rangers would have approved, but as I neglected to ask them and stored them in a magical pocket, they couldn’t refuse.  With some consultation with Master Minnik I’d gotten them to sprout just before the Fair.  I presented the big Green Mage and his delegation of Tal with a washtub packed with two dozen seedlings, and the cones for more.