Nightlord: Orb (99 page)

“Okay.”

“It’s also possible to put a spell on someone that lasts a really long time.  Kind of like a fairy-tale curse that runs forever, you can condemn someone to forever grow muscle at an accelerated rate.  They’ll have to really couch-potato it, or starve themselves, before they’ll lose muscle mass.  I did something like it with another baby—it had a heart valve problem.  I… well, ‘cursed’ it doesn’t sound right.  I put a tiny, but long-lasting spell on it to gently remind the body about how it was supposed to be shaped.  That way, when it grew up, it wouldn’t develop the same problem again.”

“More like a permanent pacemaker than a drug?”

“Not exactly, but a good way to think of it.”

“And that’s what we’re doing here?”

“No, I’m going one step farther.  What I hope to do is effect a permanent change.  I’m going to tell the body what it’s supposed to do.  That way, she isn’t alive only because she wears a spell.  The goal is a fundamental alteration, not an ongoing spell.”

“Surgery, instead of drug therapy?” she asked, dubiously.

“Hmm.  I’m not sure that’s exactly right, but it’s close.  This is a fundamental alteration of how her body works.  It’s not like a corrective surgery that might need some touch-up later in life.”

“Genetic therapy?”

“That’s the one.  I don’t know if it will affect any offspring, though.”

“And you’re not a genetic engineer?”

“That’s right.”

“So, you’re doing something fearsomely complicated without any idea about how to do it?”

“I’m going to try.  You’re not helping my confidence.”

“Sorry.”

“What I was trying to get across in this particular lesson,” I continued, “is you can use a basic framework of a spell, combined with an act of will and massive amounts of power, to alter reality.  The bigger the area and the larger the change, the more power you require.”  I rubbed the back of my neck.  “This is not the way I usually work,” I added.

“I hadn’t noticed.”

“Sarcasm,” I observed.

“Apprentice privilege.”

“If you say so.  Pay close attention, because I’m only going to do this once.  This isn’t something you’re likely to ever see again.”

I considered the baby in the conjuring circle.  She looked right back at me, impatient but still waiting.

So, you need to be healthy,
I thought. 
You need to be able to eat and to grow strong on what you eat.  Whatever you eat, you need to break down, absorb, and utilize.  Whatever you can’t use, you need to harmlessly excrete.  Your body needs to detect and recognize the differences and deal with each according to its nature.

I laid my will on the power in the chamber and shaped a general guide from it.  Only then did I trigger the four massive gemstone reserves, backing it all with grim will and iron determination.  Power surged into the conjuring circle and the area inside began to ripple, as in a heat wave.  The baby stopped looking impatient; she seemed fascinated by the swirling distortions all around her and through her.

I felt myself trying to fall forward, as though the power were sucking me in.  I braced a foot against the floor and leaned back, spreading my hands.  The surging whirl began to eat into the inner edge of the conjuring circle, an effect I’d never seen before.  It’s really not supposed to do that.  It’s really not supposed to be
able
to do that.

I gestured with both hands, eyes narrow, and gripped with my mind the whirling vortex.

This body will function perfectly.

The quasi-visible whirlwind of power began to funnel into her.  I kept my focus on the power, on the result, on the desire it had to fulfill.  The rippling distortions narrowed, quickened, whirling in a pillar centered on the baby.  It shrank, sinking into her, making her ripple with it, until the rippling quickened to vibrating, then to invisibility.

For less than a flickering instant, in a sliver of time wedged between one moment and the next, I was in the empty place between worlds.  Before me was a small, bright dot of light.  Beyond it, a somber figure.  I recognized the Grey Lady.  Silver-haired, kind smile, but with her hands folded together rather than extended in welcome.

“You are changing the destiny of the child,” She warned, nodding at the bright point floating in the formlessness between us.

“I’m trying,” I agreed.

“If neither you nor I take her beyond the world, you must return her to the Lady of the Loom.  Her thread will run through the tapestry of the world, touching lives in ways you cannot predict.”

“Chaos theory would tend to agree.”

“She may choose paths you do not approve.”

“She’s a child.  She deserves a chance to grow up and make those choices.  That’s called living.”

“Indeed it is.  You cannot know the consequences of your actions, yet you choose to risk them?”

“Does that make me different from anyone else?” I asked.  The Grey Lady shook her head, eyes twinkling.

“And if I say no?” She asked.

“I’ll ask nicely?”

The Grey Lady’s smile widened.

“And if I still say no?”

“I bit a goddess, once. I don’t want to do it again.  I’d rather resort to saying please and pretty please before getting all uncivilized.  Please?”

“You choose to defend the child’s life even at the risk of your own?”

“Some things we choose long before the choice is presented to us.”

“You are more right than you can possibly know.”

“I’m not sure I’m glad to hear it.  So… Pretty please?”

The Grey Lady laughed and opened her hands, gesturing toward me.  The bright dot drifted toward me.  I caught it in my cupped hands.

“Very well,” she said, still chuckling.  “I agree.  She is yours.”

And the power was gone, expended.  One small mountain moved, one small ocean parted, one smiting of the firstborn averted… one sudden realization I wasn’t tired—dead people don’t feel tired—but I felt drained.

I felt hungry.

Oh, dear.

The baby started to cry.  I broke the conjurer’s circle and stepped out, my guts writhing and twisting inside me.  I didn’t expect to be so depleted.  The vast majority of the energies used weren’t mine.  All I did was guide the accumulated power reserves.  My efforts were more along the order of holding a firehose rather than pumping the water.  On the other hand, holding a sufficiently large firehose at full blast can be exhausting.

Once I adjusted to the undead equivalent of tummy rumbles, I picked her up and patted her back, making soothing sounds.  She calmed down quickly.  Whatever sensations she felt as the spell affected her, they were gone.  The power surge had swamped her translation spell, so I didn’t understand what she was saying.  Well, it was hardly surprising, given the forces involved.  I took a moment to check and realized all my personal spells were down, too.  I considered myself lucky my enchanted items survived.  Mental note for the future—not that I plan on doing
this
again!

“What now?” Mary asked.  She was still standing in her circle, carefully not stepping out of it.

“To the kitchens.”

“It’s safe?” she asked, indicating the circle she still occupied.

“Should be,” I agreed.  She stepped out, gingerly, then nodded.

“You’re hungry for food?  At this hour?”

“No, it’s not for me.  I’ll eat before the night is over, that’s for sure.  Right now, I want to see if the little one likes shredded carrots.”

“Want me to get her mother?”

“Let her sleep.  I’d rather test the results before she wakes up and starts to hope again.”

“Good thought.  Are you always this generous and kindly?”

“Bite your tongue, woman.”

“I’d rather you did it.”

“Later, maybe.”

The kid loved shredded carrots.  Along with boiled
lyos
—much like an avocado, with a hint of pumpkin smell to it—and half a dozen other fruits and vegetables.  She also enjoyed the shredded
dazhu
and chicken paste.  She didn’t mind a bit that the only shredder I had was a set of teeth.  She actually found it hilarious when I pretended to eat something, then fed it to her on a spoon, or tried to.  She kept grabbing the squishy food and stuffing it in her mouth, no spoon needed.

I resolved not to tell her mother about this.

Two things—no, three things—pleased me.

First, she ate with good appetite and didn’t fight me about any of it.  In fact, she kept kicking and bouncing, threatening to come right off the table in eagerness.  Lacking a highchair, I had to sit in front of her as a safety net.

Second, her vitality visibly increased as she ate.  Whatever was wrong with her, it wasn’t wrong anymore.  At least, not for now.

Third, I had enough strength left to feel like casting a cleaning spell on us both.  She was a sloppy trencherman.  There was no excuse for getting food paste in her hair, let alone mine, but she managed it, even against my reflexes.  Take your eyes off a kid for
one second
…

With a busy day behind her and full stomach, the kid didn’t want to take a nap.  She didn’t have much of a choice, though.  She fought it with crying and wailing, but eventually surrendered.  I carried her back to the great hall and her mother.  Looking at them, I realized I couldn’t very well send them back on Bronze with her mother unconscious.  I also didn’t want to wake the mother and deal with questions.  Or crying.  Mostly the crying.  The kid provided enough crying for one night.  Moreover, if her kid really was cured, as I suspected, there would be crying—probably even sobbing—and it was likely to be on me while I was still awfully hungry.

Safety tip:  Never put your head on the shoulder of a hungry vampire.  Intentional or not, it presents your neck.

“Help me with the mother, please.”  I picked up the kid again while Mary picked up mom.

“Could you please not throw her over your shoulder like that?” I asked.  Mary rolled her eyes but shifted mom around to a cradle-carry.  We went down to the lower doors and placed them in the circular entry chamber.

“What’s the plan?” Mary inquired.

“We’re going leave the two of them in the lower entryway and I’ll give mom enough vitality to wake her up so they can leave.  After that, I’m going to sneak out another way, find a double dozen
dazhu
, and do my best to eat, drink, and not kill an entire herd of the things.  That was a big honkin’ spell and way more draining than I expected.  I find I’m more than a little hungry.”

So we did.

Mary came along for the feasting portion of the evening.  She still finds it shocking, if not frightening, how I grab the vitality of everything in an area and suck it all into me.  She does her soul-sucking retail; mine works wholesale.  On the other hand, she seems to like it when I frighten her; it excites her.  I don’t get it, but I suppose I don’t have to.

We went out into the boxed-in portion of the plains, between the southern canals and the Eastrange.  There we found a small herd of
dazhu
.  Probably a semi-domesticated herd that belonged to someone, but I didn’t plan to kill any of them.  I drained enough vitality to encourage them to lie down and stay down.  We walked among them.  I grabbed one at a time with sharp-nailed fingers and let my skin suck blood out of the holes for a little bit—a pint?  A quart?—and moved to another one.  It’s all about knowing where to open the skin, really, so they bleed enough to be worth it, but not so much they won’t heal up easily when you take the talons out.

“Why not bite them?” Mary asked, watching me as I pulled my bloodsucking version of Mork from Ork.

“First, that’s a big wound; I’m trying to avoid damaging them too much.  Second, the fangs are penetrating wounds and more prone to infection.  Third, and most important, did you ever bite a buffalo?”

“No.”

“Dusty.  Dirty.  Bad-tasting.  And the fur gets between your teeth.  Think of being a cat with a hairball.  Trust me on this.  It’s
awful
.  I know.”

“I’ll stick to people,” Mary decided.

“Probably best.”  I made a face appropriate to hacking up a
dazhu
hairball.  I remember it vividly and wish I didn’t.

“Speaking of people.  Were you really going to kill the kid?”

“If I hadn’t had an idea?  Yes.”

“Seriously?”

“Okay, look,” I began, moving to another
dazhu
.  “Before I figured out a third and fourth option, the kid had
two
.  Option one:  Starve to death in misery over the next few days, followed by a long, difficult journey to the underworld—not something the soul of a child is well-equipped to do.  Option two:  Die peacefully and quietly in her sleep, right then and there, and also avoid the long-drawn-out journey.  Either way, the kid was dead no matter what, but the second way was much less ugly and unpleasant.”