Now that I could reasonably expect that they weren’t at home I went back to the front of the main house but there I encountered an unexpected obstacle, though in retrospect I should have considered the possibility. The door wouldn’t open for me. Shields, no shields—it didn’t matter. It stubbornly refused to acknowledge my identity, and I already knew better than to try forcing it. Years ago I had tried that and the house had responded by trying to turn me into an extremely well done piece of meat.
Staring at my hand helplessly I had a second idea. There was more than one way to enter the house. Returning to the coach house I went inside; it was normally unlocked when we weren’t using it, not that a lock would have stopped me.
I withdrew my enchanting stylus from one of my pouches and rapidly sketched a circular diagram on the ground. My memory was still as clear as ever, and I knew the destination key for every one of the teleportation circles within my house. They were all within a single room/hall on the second floor, an area set aside for just such things.
Within a few minutes I had a workable circle. I had constructed the runes using simple scratches in the soft earth, so I had to be careful not to smudge the lines as I stepped into it. I would only need to use it once, so permanence wasn’t a concern.
A few words and the expenditure of a small amount of my stolen aythar was all that was needed and I found myself inside the hall of circles.
I hardly expected what I found there.
Standing in the doorway that led to the rest of the house was a man in full plate armor, heavily enchanted and armed with one of the ‘sun-swords’ I had created, in short, one of the Knights of Stone.
A lifetime of harrowing situations had honed my reflexes—I responded instantly by gaping at him stupidly. My first thought was, Why are the Knights of Stone guarding my home? My second thought was perhaps more appropriate, Oh, shit!
Sir Egan, whom I recognized from the designs on his breastplate (despite my stupor), reacted much more quickly; his sword was in his hand with a silent speed that struck terror in my heart. The sharp end of it was already pointed in my direction, and I knew he meant business.
I erected a shield with a thought and a word at the last possible moment, but it barely slowed the man who had once sworn himself to my service. The enchanted steel cut through the barrier as if it were almost non-existent and continued onward to remove my right arm and the lower part of my right leg before whipping back upward. Time seemed to slow almost to a stop as I watched my arm fall away. There was no blood, at least nothing recognizable as such. My long dead flesh held only a thick dark liquid that was probably just a remnant of my vital fluids.
The backstroke probably would have completely bisected my torso, if it hadn’t been for the fact that the loss of part of my right leg had already sent me falling backward. Instead, the tip of the greatsword cut a deep slash through my chest, cleaving ribs and sternum apart as if they were made of clay rather than bone.
Throughout the violent process, I felt remarkably little pain, nor did I suffer the shock that such an injury would have caused me if I had been properly alive. Unfortunately Sir Egan was well acquainted with fighting shiggreth. He was far from done. Before I had finished collapsing he had already taken a step back, straightening his stance and pointing his blade firmly in my direction. I knew exactly what was coming next.
I managed another hasty shield, but even as I did, I knew it was pointless. The flames were produced and focused by a rune channel I had wrought in the blade itself. The only defense I had that could deflect them was the enchanted set of shield stones that still lay in one of my pouches. The fire burned its way through my shield and began devouring my flesh.
I screamed then, for the flames brought a pain with them that simple cuts had lacked. That would likely have been the end of me, but for a simple distraction. Penny arrived.
The flames stopped as Sir Egan held up one hand to warn her away, “Please step back, my lady. It still has his magic.”
My body was a ruin of charred and burned flesh. I had curled instinctively into a ball, protecting my face and belly, but everything else was a horror. The fire had taken only a few seconds to do that much, a few more and I would be reduced to ash.
“Is that him?”
I heard her voice and turned my head to face her, opening my eyes to see her once again, although my magesight had already shown her to me. Our eyes locked for a moment and the revulsion that passed across her features nearly undid me.
“Yes, my lady, I recognized him immediately,” answered Sir Egan.
Her face hardened, and I sensed the children running down the hallway. They would be there in just seconds. “That’s not my husband. He died fighting to protect us. Get rid of that abomination before they see it. I won’t have it dishonoring his memory!” She stepped back to keep Moira from reaching the doorway while Sir Egan turned his attention back toward me.
I wondered what would happen if my body were completely incinerated, but even as I considered the question I realized I already knew the answer. My ancestor had done the same thing to Thillmarius once, sending his cursed spirit to wander the void. The same would happen to me. The spell-weaving wrapped around my soul would never let me fully die, but without a body…
“Penny,” I began, wondering if I could somehow convince her, and I saw a shiver run down her spine as I said her name. Whether I might have persuaded her or not, I never got the chance to find out. Glancing downward I realized I was still lying upon the teleportation circle I had arrived on.
Sir Egan’s hands tightened around the hilt of his sword as he unleashed the flames again, but they failed to reach me. With a word I was gone.
Chapter 7
Every teleportation circle has two keys that have to be specified when the circle is inscribed. One key that identifies the circle itself, and another that identifies the circle that is its destination. The impromptu circle I had created in the carriage house had been set to take me to a circle inside my home in Albamarl, but that circle had been keyed for Cameron Castle, which turned out to be fortunate. I arrived inside the circle building in the castle yard. While I had had guards posted on the building for years, they normally stayed outside, and today was no exception.
I lay there, a wretched mass of burned flesh. Absent the flames, I had virtually no pain, but I knew I must look terrible. My newly separated arm and lower leg lay underneath me, so I rolled over and pulled them out. A visual inspection revealed that other than the brute fact of their excision from my body, they were generally in better condition than the rest of me.
I could tell that my flesh was already repairing itself, regenerating. That would’ve been a handy trick so many times when I was alive, I thought to myself. As an experiment, I held the end of my severed arm against the stump it had once been attached to. The flesh began knitting itself together almost immediately. I wondered what would happen if I lost the arm—would I grow a new one? There were too many unknowns for me to judge. I pushed the thought aside and used my power more actively, sealing the skin around the edges to help hold it in place better. I repeated the process with my leg.
The healing process, if that was the proper term for repairing dead flesh, seemed to take a long time and I worried that someone might wander in and discover me. Since the only people that could activate the circles were wizards, like Elaine or Walter, that meant I’d be in serious jeopardy. As Sir Egan had just taught me, even a Knight of Stone was a terrible risk for me.
After a couple of hours I was able to stand and move normally. The regeneration process required less energy than I’d expected. My aythar no longer restored itself naturally and I felt slightly weaker once the healing was finished but I still retained a considerable amount of power.
During my trip through the wilderness I had collected a considerable store of aythar from various plants and animals, the human aythar I had gotten from Myrtle, despite its special qualities, was a drop in the bucket beside that. Is there a limit
to how much I can collect or retain?
That was when I had my final epiphany. Not really, you’re just like the gods, an immortal parasite feeding and growing fat on the aythar of living beings. That was probably why Moira and my ancestral namesake hadn’t used living people for their experiments. It was likely also the reason the She’Har hadn’t used this particular spell-weave on themselves. Well, until Thillmarius used it on himself in desperation, I amended mentally.
I made a conscious effort of will to stop feeling sorry for myself. Things needed doing and being in Castle Cameron wasn’t really the worst place. For one thing I knew the place intimately, and I could easily replace my ruined clothes here. Now that I knew Penny was in Albamarl, it was an easy guess that my children and probably Rose and Dorian were there with her. I just had to avoid the Prathions while I moved about. It would also be easy to send my letter here, since as far as I knew Lady Thornbear still lived nearby in Lancaster.
The Prathions would be the biggest problem. While I could probably create an illusion to disguise my appearance from normal folk, their wizardly senses would immediately detect such a ruse. If I possessed their skill with illusion, or invisibility in particular, I could circumvent them—but I didn’t.
Walter, and his two adult children, Elaine and George, all possessed the family gifts. Only his wife, Rebecca was a non-mage. Officially they lived in Arundel, a barony that owed fealty to me, but in practice all three of them spent significant amounts of time in Castle Cameron. Well, they had back when I was alive. It was anyone’s guess now. With my death they might have had fewer reasons to stay close at hand.
Either way, I needed to find some method of fooling them soon. If I intended to spend much time in Albamarl or other civilized areas I was bound to run into them. If my recent appearances had created too much alarm, they might soon be tasked with tracking me down. While I had never feared facing any of them in terms of relative power, my ability to hide was nowhere near sufficient to evade them. A direct confrontation would only lead to their deaths, or if I surrendered, my failure to accomplish my goals.
“C’mon, think Mordecai!” I chided myself, “You’re supposed to be the most brilliant enchanter since the days of yore. Find a solution.” Thankfully my horrifying transformation hadn’t impaired my sense of humility.
It was an accurate assessment of my options however. Since I no longer seemed to be able to interact with the voices of the earth and wind, my wizardly ability was all that was left to me, and as time had shown, enchanting was my best skill. It wasn’t particularly useful in hiding me from other wizards, though. A solid enchantment might block magesight, or even hide an empty area from it, but I had never succeeded in using it to create true invisibility, not the sort the Prathions seemed to create anyway.
I don’t need invisibility. I simply need to keep them from seeing the void.
Any well-constructed enchantment could block magesight. I could enchant my clothes… once I had obtained new ones, of course. I immediately discarded that notion, enchanted clothing would be suspicious. It might help to hide my nature, but it wouldn’t cover my entire body, and it certainly wouldn’t hide my identity. I was the only highly proficient enchanter in the world. Walter and his children were only occasional dabblers. Anything as unusual as enchanted clothing would be immediately obvious.
Unless…
“If a lie cannot follow rules one or two, it should be so preposterous or unbelievable that no one will doubt it.” That was the third rule of lying, and I could still hear Marc’s voice in my mind as he had reminded me of it years ago.
“He would have loved this,” I told myself, feeling again the twinge of pain that came whenever I remembered my lost friend. I needed to reach my workshop.
Rising I made a quick inventory of my possessions. My clothing was practically non-existent now. I still had my boots, though they had seen better days. The belt, that had until a half an hour ago held my magical pouches, was now ruined. The flames had burned away the half of it that wrapped around my back. Fortunately, the part in the front, where my pouches were, had been shielded by my body when I had curled up on the ground.
I collected my pouches and the burnt remains of my clothing. It wouldn’t do to leave evidence here of my arrival. Naked now, except for my boots, I moved to the door that led outside and used my magic to create an illusion, disguising myself as one of my guardsmen. I just had to hope I didn’t run into the very man I was impersonating—or any of the Prathions.
My next obstacle was getting out unobserved. It would be highly suspicious if I tried to exit the supposedly empty building, no matter what disguise I was using. The best option would be not to be seen exiting. To that end, I used a simple bit of magic to create a loud noise outside the building, making it emanate from around the corner. The sound I chose was that of a man being struck and then slamming into a wall, something I had heard many times before. Which says volumes about the quality of my life experiences, I noted.
As expected, the guard outside heard the noise and quickly ran to investigate. I monitored his movements with my magesight, and as soon as he went around the corner I opened the door to step out, closing it behind me. I waited his post, knowing he’d be back within seconds, once he saw there was nothing where the sound came from.
I recognized the man immediately as he returned; it was Jerod, one of our more experienced guards. He had been on the list of candidates for elevation to the Knights of Stone. If I hadn’t died unexpectedly, he would have probably been knighted by now. As it was, it was unlikely there would ever be any more. “What the hell are you doing off your post soldier!” I shouted at him as soon as he spotted me. His face registered alarm when he realized who I was.
He snapped to attention as he responded briskly, “Investigating a sudden noise, Captain!”
The illusory disguise I had chosen made me look like Carl Draper, the captain of my castle guard and the most senior non-knight. I had picked him because no one else would bother him with questions, unless I ran into the man I was impersonating. I might have chosen one of my knights, but my illusion had limits and trying to pretend I was wearing full plate armor would have been problematic, one random moment of contact would have given me away.
I spent the next minute or two giving Jerod hell. I should have felt bad about it, but it was the most engaging conversation I’d had with another human being in quite some time. The biggest challenge was not grinning at him while I dressed him down verbally.
Once I felt he’d had enough I left, giving him one final warning not to let me catch him off his post again. After that I headed directly for my first destination, my workshop. As I went, I scanned the castle environs carefully, watching for any sign of Walter, Elaine, or George. I had yet to detect any of them, and my hopes rose. If they were absent I’d have a much easier time moving about.
Lady Luck decided to be kind for a change, and I encountered no one on my way to my workshop. It’s about time. She’s been nothing but a bitch to me lately. Dead, exiled, even burned—if I didn’t have bad luck I’d have none at all, I observed silently. I did spot Gavin Traylor, the smith I had hired, but that was to be expected since my workshop was very close to the smithy. He was busily hammering away at his latest project, so if he noticed my passing it was only peripherally.
Having reached my shop, I made sure no one was observing me before I entered. It might spark some curiosity if the guard captain was seen entering my workshop without a plausible excuse. I put my hand on the door handle and pushed. It stubbornly refused to budge.
“Sonofabitch!” I cursed under my breath. I had forgotten the door enchantment. To deter the curious, particularly some of the village youths, I had enchanted the door to only open at the touch of certain people. Much like the door in Albamarl, this one no longer recognized me. And this is why you should have set it up with a password instead, idiot!
Of course, no one expects to die and return as an undead life-drinking monster. I could pr
obably be forgiven for not anticipating that eventuality. Reaching into one of the pouches I was still awkwardly carrying I pulled out my enchanting stylus. Using it as a simple rune channel I created a thin line of power with it, cutting the door from its hinges. I hadn’t bothered to set up serious protections for the rest of the door or the walls, the lock enchantment had simply been a deterrent.
I tried to make the damage as unobtrusive as possible. I would have to put the door back in place once I was finished, and I didn’t want anyone to know I’d been inside, at least not in the immediate future. The door fell outward as I cut the final hinge, so I caught it with one hand and held it in place until I had stepped inside, pulling it back into position behind me. A few quick words and I created a temporary spell to hold it in place until I was ready to leave.
Once again I lamented the loss of my abilities as an archmage. While they were dangerous to use, in the past I might have simply used them to move through the wall without damaging it or the door. No helping that now, I thought, turning my mind back to the task at hand.
Rummaging through the odds and ends on my worktable, I was caught by the memories of my many projects. “So much of this will go to waste,” I said to myself, “No one will have a clue what these things were made for.” I spotted a heavy leather belt and used it to replace the one that had held my magical pouches. Then I began adding things to them.
My hand came to rest on a set of rune-inscribed diamond cubes, each of them measuring two inches on a side. While the material they were made of was of incalculable value, it had been easy for me to obtain. I had asked, and the earth had supplied—much like the iron I had used to construct the Iron Heart Chamber. I had used diamond because while the cubes didn’t store power when at rest, when in use they would have to handle enormous quantities of aythar. Iron might have been adequate for the task, but I wasn’t sure.