The Warlock is Missing (17 page)

"'Twould be wise," Kelly agreed, and swerved off the road into the trees. "Turn, Iron Horse! At the least, the rain will reach us less beneath leaves."

Thunder rumbled again, and the first raindrops sprinkled the road as the children turned to follow Kelly. They thrashed

their way through the underbrush at the side of the road. After fifty feet or so, the forest floor became relatively clear, as the deep shade of the towering trees cut off sunlight from the small growth. There were still roots and saplings, so the unicorn and the robot-horse couldn't really run. They hurried as quickly as they could, though, trotting. Kelly led the way, dodging saplings and vaulting tree roots.

" 'Tis a hut!" Geoffrey cried, pointing.

The children looked up, then swerved off after him with glad cries. The unicorn followed, responding to Cordelia's nudge.

"Nay, children!" Kelly cried. "Will ye not heed? There's something about that hut I like not!"

But the children ran blithely on.

He frowned up at Fess. "Hast thou naught to say? Do ye not also mislike it?"

The great black horse nodded.

Kelly ducked into a hollow at the base of a tree and dropped down, cross-legged, folding his arms. "I'll not move from here! Do as I do, ye great beast—will ye not? Let's bide here without, and watch and wait, so we can spring to their aid if they need us."

Fess nodded again, and crowded up against the tree, to block the rain from Kelly's doorway.

The two older boys shot through the window. The unicorn pulled up short at the doorway. Cordelia sprang down, and hammered on the panel. It swung open, and Geoffrey stood there. "Who would it be, calling at this time of the day? Eh! We have no need of your ware!"

"Oh, be not so silly!" Cordelia ducked in through the doorway, hauling Gregory with her. She stopped and looked around in surprise. "Doth none live here then?"

"If one doth, he is not at home." Geoffrey looked around at the empty interior. Gregory scuttled past his hip.

Cordelia turned to look up at the unicorn. "Will you not come in, then?"

The unicorn tossed her head and turned away, trotting back toward the wood.

"Come back!" Cordelia cried.

The silver beast turned and looked back, tossing her head and pawing the turf. Then she whirled away, trotting off among the trees.

"Hath she left again, then?" Geoffrey said hopefully.

"Oh, be still!" Cordelia turned back, tilting her nose up. "She doth but seek her own form of shelter. I misdoubt me an she doth not trust housen."

"Nor do I." Magnus was looking around the hut with a frown. "How can this chamber be so much larger than it seemed from the outside?"

Cordelia shrugged and went to sit on a three-legged stool by the fireplace. "All houses do seem smaller from without."

"Yet 'twas not a house—'twas but a hut of sticks! And here within, 'tis a solid house of timbers, with walls of wattle and daub!" Magnus went over to the table set against one wall and frowned up at the shelves above it. "What manner of things are these?" He pointed from one bottle to another. "Eye of newt… fur of bat… venom of viper…"

"They are the things of magic," Gregory said, round-eyed.

Magnus nodded somberly. "I think that thou hast the right of it. And they are not the cleanly things, such as old Agatha doth use when she doth brew potions, but foul and noisome." He turned back to his brothers and sister. "This is a witch's house, and worse—'tis a sorcerer's!"

The door slammed open, and a tall old man hunched in, face and form shrouded by a hooded robe. A yellowed beard jutted out of its shadow, wiggling as he swore to himself, "What ill chance, that such foul weather should spring up! What noisome hag hath enchanted the clouds this day?" He dropped a leather pouch on the table in the center of the room. "At the least, ere dawn, I gained the graveyard earth I sought —so the trek served its purpose." He yanked off his robe, muttering to himself, went to hang it by the fire—and stopped, staring down at Cordelia.

She shrank back into the inglenook, trying hard to make herself invisible.

The old man was tattered and grubby, wearing a soiled tunic and cross-gartered hose. His face was gaunt, with a hooked blade of a nose and yellowed, bloodshot eyes beneath stringy hair that straggled down from a balding pate—hair that might have been white, if he had washed it more often. Slowly, he grinned, showing a few yellow teeth—most of them were missing. Then he chuckled and stepped toward Cordelia, reaching out a hand blotched with liver-spots.

"Stand away from my sister!" Geoffrey cried, leaping between them.

The sorcerer straightened, eyebrows shooting up in surprise. "Eh! There's another of them!" He turned, saw Gregory and, behind him, Magnus, hunched forward, hands on their daggers—but he saw also the fear in the backs of their eyes. He laughed, a high, shrill cackle, as he whirled to slam the door shut and drop a heavy oaken bar across it. "I have them!" he crowed, "I have them! Nay, just the things, the very things that I'll need!"

"Need?" Dread hollowed Magnus's voice. "What dost thou speak of?"

"What dost thou think I speak of?" the sorcerer spat, whirling toward him. He stumped forward with a malevolent glint in his eye. "What manner of house dost thou think thou hast come to, child?"

Magnus swallowed heavily and said, "A sorcerer's."

"Eh-h-h-h." The sorcerer nodded slowly, a gleam in his eye. "Thou hast sense, at the least. And what doth a sorcerer
do
, lad?"

"He doth… doth brew… magics."

"Well! So thou knowest that little, at least! Yet the better sorcerers do seek to discover new magics—as I do. For I am Lontar, a sorcerer famed throughout the countryside for weird spells and fell!"

The children stiffened, recognizing the name of the man who had cursed old Phagia.

Again, the gap-toothed grin. "And I've found one that will give me power over every soul in this parish! Nay, further— in the county, mayhap the whole kingdom!"

Gregory stared up at the old man's eyes and thought,
He is mad
.

"Hush!" Magnus hissed, clapping a hand onto his shoulder, for Gregory had not cast his thoughts in their family's private way. But Lontar's grin widened. "Patience—he is young. He knoweth not yet that all witch-folk can hear one another's thoughts. But I…" he tapped his chest. "I am more. I can make others hear
my
thoughts—aye, even common folk, lowly peasant folk, with not one grain of witch-power in their brains!"

The children were silent, staring at him.

The sorcerer cackled, enjoying their fright. "Yet 'tis not thoughts alone I can send, nay! For years I have studied, trying and trying, again and again, whetting my powers with one weird brew after another—yet I have learned the craft of it, aye, learned it until I can work this spell without drinking even a drop of the potion, nor a whiff of its fumes! First with mere earthworms, then with the robins who came for them, then with field mice, rabbits, wolves, bears—all, all now cower before me! All shrink and howl, turn and flee, when I do cast this into their brains!"

"Cast what?" Even Geoffrey could not quite disguise the dread in his voice.

"Why… pain!" The sorcerer cackled with high glee. "'Tis pain, pure! Pain, searing pain, as though thy head did burn, and thy whole body did scream with the stings of a thousand bees! 'Tis pain, pain, the root of all power—for pain doth cause fear, and fear doth make all to obey! Yet!" He speared a long, bony forefinger straight up. "My work is not done! I cannot yet go forth, to take rule of the county! For I've not done with the last task!"

"And what task is that?" Magnus's voice trembled in spite of all his efforts; he could feel the feared answer coming.

"Why, people! Casting the pain into the minds of real people! With bears I have done it, with wolves, but never with people!" The sorcerer's eyes glittered. "To make human brains flame, to make mortal folk scream at my mere thought! And why have I not? Why, 'tis that I've never found folk with whom I could attempt it! Long have I sought some, to use for my learning—yet never did they come, strangers and alone, into my wood. Ever, ever did they come accompanied, three or four grown ones together—or they had folk who would seek them, an they did not return!"

"So have we!" Geoffrey said stoutly. "We too have folk who will scour this forest, an we come not home!"

"Thou dost lie." The sorcerer leveled a forefinger at him. "Never have I set eyes upon thee before; thou art not of this parish; thou art come from afar. And thou hast come without parents! None do so—save orphans! Or ones who do flee!" He cackled with glee at his own cleverness. "Nay, none will come seeking thee—and if they did, who would know where thou hast gone?"

"But the count!" Magnus cried, grasping at straws. "The count would call his men out against thee!"

"The count!" Lontar crowed. "Nay, there is no count! Dost thou not know? A giant did seize him! A giant did break down the door of the count's castle in the darkest hour of night, did thrust the count and his family into a bag, and commanded all

the knights and men-at-arms to put down their swords on pain of their lord's death! Then he clapped all those proud warriors in the deepest, dark dungeons, and hauled the count and his family away into his own hidden prison. The count? Ah, the count shall do naught! Nor can he, when I've learned to use my torture spell to its fullest! He, even he, shall not resist me—nor shall Groghat the giant! Even him shall I humble, even him shall I bring to his knees, screaming with the pain that sears through his brain! None will resist me; all will bow down!"

Suddenly, Gregory stilled, staring at him, unblinking.

"And I'll begin it with
thee
!" The old sorcerer spun, leveling a forefinger at Cordelia.

"Nay, thou shalt not!" Rage flared in Magnus in a moment of pure hate, every gram of emotion directed at the old sorcerer. Geoffrey's wrath joined his, and Cordelia's terrified anger.

Gregory cried, "I have it!" and instantly his brothers and sister found in their minds the old sorcerer's method for concentrating thought and projecting pain. With it came memories of the pain and terror of little animals, spurring the children to greater anger, and greater, as their fear and wrath focused into the old sorcerer while Cordelia screamed and screamed, the force of her horror tearing through the old man's brain with her brothers' hatred and rage behind it, stabbing through from temple to temple, searing his mind with his own techniques until his howl turned into a raw, hoarse scream. His body stiffened, hands curling into claws; he stood, back arched, for one frozen instant, then collapsed in a heap on the floor, totally silent.

The children stared, appalled, anger evaporating in an instant. Finally, Cordelia spoke. "Is… is he…"

Gregory was staring intently at the old body. "His heart hath stopped."

"We have slain him!" Cordelia cried, in dismay.

"More to the better!" Geoffrey snapped.

But Magnus said, "Nay! We must not have blood on our hands, an we can prevent it! What would Mama and Papa say?"

"That he is a vile, evil man," Geoffrey answered.

"But they would say also that we must spare his life, an we can." Cordelia knelt down by the body, gazing intently at Lontar's face. "What we have done thus far they would ap-

prove, for we have done it only in defense of ourselves—and I thank you, my brothers!" She gave each of them a warm look of gratitude that made even Geoffrey forget his anger for a moment; then she turned back to the sorcerer. "Now, though, 'tis another matter. Now we can spare his life—and we will, an we can start his heart to beating once again!"

"How canst thou do that?" Geoffrey questioned; but Magnus joined Gregory and Cordelia beside the waxen body, staring down.

"Be guided by me," Cordelia breathed, "for this is women's work, in this land. Squeeze the left of the heart, when I bid thee—now!"

With telekinesis, they massaged the heart. All three of them thought a squeeze on the left-hand side of the heart, then let go immediately.

"Now, the right side," Cordelia instructed, and they all squeezed together. "Now the left again… now right… left-right… left-right… left-right…"

They kept at it for several minutes while Geoffrey stood back glowering, his arms folded.

"It doth beat of its own," Gregory reported.

"Aye," Cordelia agreed, "but faintly. Keep pressing, brothers, but softly now."

Gradually, bit by bit, they lightened the pressure till, finally, the old man's heart was beating regularly again. Cordelia breathed a long, shaky sigh and sat back on her heels. "'Tisdone!"

"Mama would be proud of thee," Gregory said, beaming.

"And of thee." Cordelia managed a tremulous smile before she sighed again. "Eh, brothers! I hope that never again shall I come so close to causing another's death!"

"If thou dost," Geoffrey growled, "I trust he will deserve it as deeply as this one did."

Cordelia frowned down at the old sorcerer. "He hath caused great suffering, 'tis true."

Gregory frowned, too. "Mama and Papa hath said that when a person's heart is stopped too long, the brain can suffer hurt."

"Aye, and full damage." Magnus scowled, concentrating. The room was silent a moment while his brothers and sister watched him; then he nodded. "All is as it should be. From what I can tell, there is no damage done."

"There should have been," Geoffrey hissed.

Magnus glanced up at him, irritated, but said nothing—he couldn't really disagree.

"Yet I think he will not be so quick to offer injury again," Cordelia said thoughtfully.

"Aye… yet let us be certain." Magnus glared down at Lontar's unconscious face. The old man twitched in his sleep, and Magnus said, "Lay words, Gregory."

The little boy's face screwed up for a moment, then relaxed.