The (sort of) Dark Mage (Waldo Rabbit) (3 page)

XXX

In this castle there were undead servants and living slaves; the only people who were ‘free’ were the members of the family. He’d read plenty of books about the people who lived in other countries. Folk who in their whole lives never saw the dead walking, and would be terrified just by a single unarmed skeleton shuffling towards them. For Waldo dark magics and the undead were the stuff of ordinary life.

He had been born into this world and, to his eyes, it was all normal. Waldo loved Alteroth, with its volcanoes and slow flowing rivers of magma. He loved the way they glowed at night, and how they rumbled and sent ash up into the perpetually grey sky. Waldo had witnessed several eruptions and thought them beautiful beyond words. He loved the city of Alter, with its clean and logical design. The squat, identical houses packed in their neat rows, the avenues that all ran in perfect lines, the city was a monument to order and control. He didn’t get to actually visit it often, but he could stare at its lovely symmetry for hours from his window. It was a beautiful.

In this world power was everything.

From the time he was a child he’d been taught not to fear death; only weakness. Being weak was the only unforgivable sin. Waldo wanted to be strong. Not really for himself, but for his family and for his mother. He did not want to fail or bring them shame. For the sake of his family, he wanted to be a great Dark Mage.

His mother had, had a total of seven children, of which he was the youngest and only one still currently alive. Four were dead and two (including Walter) were mostly dead. They had all died violent deaths, none of them living to reach nineteen. All had been born with the gift of summoning mana and an ability to use magic.

Their individual talents had differed. Roland (who Waldo did not remember) had specialized in fire magic. Gwen had taken after mom and been a natural at necromancy. Walter had always had a gift at summoning and controlling monsters. All of them had been talented with great potential. All of them had been a credit to their House.

Waldo thought about his own abilities and let out a frustrated grunt.

Healing and protection magic, that was what he was best at. He had absolutely no talent at necromancy, he couldn’t even reanimate a mouse. Whenever he attempted any sort of destructive spell it always went horribly wrong… and not even in the good sort of horribly wrong. When he tried to summon monsters…

He let out another frustrated sigh.

The ability to use magic was, in itself, a rare trait in humans. When it manifested, it differed from person to person, both in depth and in direction. Some would never have the strength to do much more than levitate a book or light a candle. Others could summon giants or tear open the earth. The amount of mana a person could draw was an inborn ability. You could learn spells and train to draw the energy more easily; but the limit was in your blood.

There were written spells and incantations, rules of magic, runes, and wards; things that a magic user could learn and study. Spellbooks, wands, rods, magical rings, scrolls, and other items made casting certain spells easier. Yet magic was much more of an art than a science. In theory every magic user should have been capable of casting any spell, so long as it did not require too much mana. In practice it was nothing like that. The sorts of spells a wizard could work were a reflection of his soul.

Waldo stood.  The summoning circle was perfect. He would bring forth a homunculus and bind it to his will. Being sixteen, it was long past time to have his own familiar. He began performing the required hand gestures and spoke the incantation. “
Ithkaros venti setarros abro homoculi tenos arrilo venti sem apparos
!”

The circle and the symbols he had so carefully chalked suddenly blazed with light. He felt the mana flow out of him and into the circle.

It’s going to work this time! I know it!
Waldo thought.

The interior of the circle vanished, as space and time were momentarily shattered.

“Bring me my servant!” Waldo shouted into the void.

Bending to his will the spell brought forth a living creature.

“Chirp. Chirp. Chirp.”

There within the summoning circle was a confused blue bird.

“Oh not again!”

XXX

Six skeletons in rusted chainmail walked along the hall. With each step the scabbards attached to their bony hips clicked. These were just a handful of the guards who protected Castle Corpselover. They would patrol these corridors again and again and again without fail until their bodies broke down. The guards of this castle never tired, never complained, and would never betray their mistress. If a stranger appeared before them they would draw their swords and fight to the end. How could anyone ask for more than that?

Waldo passed them without a second thought. They were as much a part of his home as the paintings on the wall or the furniture. They shuffled past unheeding.

Waldo was thinking about his most recent failure. The summoning circle had been perfect and so had the enchantment. He understood that the more difficult the spell the easier it was to make a mistake. Something as basic as say lighting a candle could be done with nothing more than a thought. More difficult tasks might require a word or two or a hand gesture. Complex spells needed a specific incantation or the use of an item like a wand or magical ring. Summoning a creature without a contract was a high end spell and demanded an incantation, hand gestures, and a summoning circle with a proper containment for the specific creature.

I did everything right
, Waldo thought.
I did! Why didn’t it work?

In a sense the summoning had worked… sort of, but a blue bird was not a homunculus. The only positive he could take from his recent effort was that at least he could summon. He couldn’t even use necromancy. For a Corpselover that was worse than embarrassing, it was downright humiliating. His family was known for its ability with raising and using the dead. It was where their damn name came from! His mother was acknowledged the greatest necromancer in all Alteroth. Being unable to use it at all made Waldo feel unworthy. He wanted so much to make mother and the family proud of him. How could he ever do that when he was such a complete failure at the family specialty?

As he neared a corner in the hallway he waved his hand. “
Repulso
.”

Even unseen Walter was thrown from the hiding spot and sent flying down a side corridor. His brother cried out in frustration as Waldo kept going.

Healing spells, wards, spell traps, and protective magics all came to him easily.
That
was his gift. That sort of magic did have its place and its uses, but in Alteroth that place was quite low. No one respected healers. The ability to destroy or to control was what mattered.

Behind him Walter shouted. “Why do you always just let me go? Why don’t you destroy me?! Am I so pathetic to you?”

“It would make mother sad.”

He heard Walter curse him. Waldo knew his brother really would kill him if he ever got the chance. Mother would be upset, but she wouldn’t punish Walter if it happened. Children were protected until they knew enough to put on the robes as apprentice mages. From that point on you were expected to protect yourself. Not just from outside enemies, but from your own family as well. The world was hard and you had to be strong enough to not only face it but to take what you wanted from it. There was no place in the family for the weak.

Waldo wondered if that was what he was.

The truth was he had no wish to kill anyone, not even Walter. He had no desire to control others or acquire power. All he wanted was to make mom proud of him. Waldo wanted to be a powerful Dark Mage and a proper Corpselover because that was what would make her proud.

He had talent with magic and the ability to draw on quite a lot of mana. What he didn’t have was the same mindset as everyone else. Why did he have a problem with killing? Why didn’t the idea of having power over others excite him? Why had he never hungered to be heir?

“What the hell is wrong with me?”

XXX

Castle Corpselover had nine towers and five dungeons. The main castle itself had five floors each with dozens of rooms and a different lay out. The hallways twisted and turned with various side corridors that came to abrupt ends or could go in a circle. Some of the stairways only went up or down one floor and the walls were riddled with secret passageways and hidden rooms. It was not hard at all to go from one end of the castle to the other without ever stepping into the main hallway, if you knew what you were about.

On the fifth floor he took the second corridor on the left off the main hall. Halfway down it there was another side corridor. This one curved around like a fishhook until it ended in a small alcove. Hanging on the wall was a full length mirror, six feet high, with brass trim that was polished so that it shined like gold.

The mirror itself was made of glass and its surface was perfectly smooth and clear. Standing before it Waldo could not see himself or the corridor around him. There was no reflection; there was only a perfect grey emptiness there.

“Sister, will you come and talk to me?”

He waited. She usually came when he asked, but not always.

He waited for a long time while nothing happened. He was about to go when he saw some of the mirror’s grey melt away. Colors swirled, like mixed paint in a bucket. A figure slowly began to take form. Waldo waited.

It took a few minutes, but finally she was standing there on the other side of the mirror; his sister Gwen. She had been sixteen when she died on her First Quest. It had happened outside the borders of Alteroth so there had been no way to recover her body. Mother had instead bound her soul into this mirror.

Waldo had been only twelve when Gwen died, still just a child under mother’s protection. Gwen had always been gentle to him. Unlike Walter, and most of his other siblings, she had never mocked his eyes or teased him about his many failures. Gwen had never bullied him and he had loved her almost as much as he had mother. He didn’t know if that would have changed once he was older; but he hoped not. She had taken after mother both in looks and talent. Gwendolyn had been a promising necromancer and candidate to be heir. The sweetness she had shown him had not affected her ability to be a Dark Mage.

She appeared before him dressed in black robes that highlighted her attractive figure. She had long straight black hair, auburn eyes, and the same delicate features as mother. Her skin though was a bleached white and her throat was slashed from ear to ear, the cut slowly bled all the while she stood there.

“You look sad little brother,” Gwen said with a sympathetic glance. “Did Walter try and eat you again?” The words came in a rasp, her wound quivering with each syllable.

“Yes he did, but that was no big deal.”

Gwen’s pale lips twitched into an amused grin. “I would have destroyed him a long time ago. You are truly merciful little brother.”

“Please don’t insult me.”

“I am only being truthful,” Gwen croaked.

In Alteroth and within the Corpselover family, mercy was not a virtue but a weakness.

“I just don’t hate him,” Waldo confessed. “I know I should. The Dark Powers know he was never fair to me even when he was alive, but I just feel sorry for him now. He was the heir and a Dark Mage. Now what is he?”

“You have a kind heart.”

“If you’re going to keep insulting me I’m leaving.”

Gwen gave a slow rasping laugh. “I truly love you little brother, even though you are strange.”

Waldo sighed. “I love you too.”

In this world love was also seen as a weakness, but it was at least an accepted weakness. It was only natural for human beings to feel love, even if they were necromancers. In Alteroth parents still loved their children, children loved their parents, husbands and wives (sometimes) loved each other, and people could love their friends and companions. Love alone though was never an excuse for being soft or indulgent. Seeking power had to come before all else.