Arts of Dark and Light: Book 01 - A Throne of Bones (13 page)

It didn’t take long for the dragon to hunt down the three remaining survivors. The landscape was too broken and stony for the men to run, but even if it had been flat prairie, there was no way they could possibly have hoped to escape the murderous wrath of the vengeful beast.

The third mage did not resist. He kneeled in what looked like prayer as the dragon fell upon him, but his divine implorings availed him little—the great dagger-like teeth closed over him. A moment later there was no sign of him except for the dark blood trickling down over the lighter red scales of the beast’s chin. The fourth mage’s death was by far the worst to watch, as he was seized in one huge clawed foot and shredded into bloody tatters by the repeated application of the other foot as the beast soared into the sky.

Only one mage left. Theuderic hoped he might have somehow escaped. The cries of horror and dismay voiced by the watching mages were interrupted by high-pitched peals of elven laughter. Lithriel was no longer shaking in silence, but was now laughing openly. Her slanted eyes were glistening with tears, and she was shaking almost uncontrollably. The other mages were beginning to look at her with disbelief and even a little disgust. It was one thing to hear of the famous cruelty of the elves, but it was something else entirely to witness it as your colleagues, brothers-in-arms, and in some cases, friends, were torn to shreds by a dragon.

“Stop it,” Theuderic hissed at her. “You may not care about these men, but their friends and colleagues have just watched them die. So for the love of all that’s clean and holy, hold your tongue!”

“I…I’m sorry,” she gasped. “His face, it was just so f-f-funny!”

Theuderic put his head in his hands, abandoning the attempt to talk sense into her. He wasn’t sure it mattered anyhow. The elfess had been a tremendous help to Narcisse in trying to adapt the spell, but given the spectacular failure it now appeared to be, she would also make for the ideal scapegoat.

She elbowed him. “Theudros, darling, do you know how to break the link to the crystal?” Her voice was suddenly under control again, and a worried note in her voice made him feel tense.

“I know the basic idea behind it, but I’ve never even tried the spell. It’s an advanced one and requires some very expensive materials, if I understand correctly. Only the immortels make use of them.”

She frowned at him. “So, you don’t. But do you see that the last of your little mages is standing in front of the crystal there? He seems to be shouting at it.”

Theuderic noticed. The view had shifted again and was now focused directly on the one mage who still alive. Theuderic recognized him. His name was Charles-Francois, he was from a noble family in the Seven Seats, and he was about to die. Behind and above him, the shape of the onrushing dragon rapidly grew larger.

“The sound doesn’t come through the crystal. The light does,” Lithriel said. “Do you know if anything else comes with it?”

Already annoyed with her, Theuderic almost dismissed her seemingly cryptic and untimely question with a
mot sarcastique
when its significance struck him like a thunderbolt. He realized, to his horror, that heat tended to be rather more closely akin to light than to sound. “seigneur Gabrien,” he called to the oldest academicien present. “Break the link to the crystal now! You must break the link!”

“Why must we do that? It’s a terrible sight, but there is still much to be learned. If you have a weak stomach for such things, Sieur Theuderic, I advise you to look away.” The old man shook his head and leaned toward seigneur Josce-Robinet. “Are all the young ones so tender these days? In my day, they were made of sterner stuff.”

“The heat from the dragon’s flames,” Theuderic said desperately, seeing the dragon looming behind the Charles-Francois’s head. “It may come through the link!”

The old master of magic looked vaguely surprised. “The heat? Oh, yes, the flames. Do you know, I hadn’t considered that.”

Theuderic had heard enough. “Everyone, get down and shield yourselves!” He grabbed Lithriel and rolled off the divan with her. As soon as she was safely beneath him, he summoned his strongest shield, one that had saved him from many an arrow or sword thrust, to cover them both.

It belatedly occurred to him that a shield with a stronger Water component might be better suited to defeat the heat, but his instincts were faster than his reason, and anyway, it was already too late now.

For, as he looked over his shoulder, he saw old Gabrien kneeling in front of the great crystal, his aged hands reaching out for it as he sought to dispel the arcane link that connected the two attuned crystals. Then there was a blinding but silent burst of pure white light so bright that Theuderic was forced to look away.

But he could still hear. He heard the old sorcerer’s scream as the terrible heat from the dragon’s fiery assault was transmitted through the magical connection. Theuderic could feel the sudden heat flaring against his shield as a sort of psychic pressure, but it was less than he had feared, and it lasted for less than a ten-count.

As suddenly as it appeared, the heat vanished, although from where he lay, it was impossible to know if that was because the link had been severed, the crystal on the far side had been destroyed, or if the dragon were simply preparing another blast. He released his shield and rolled off Lithriel. To his horror, he saw Gabrien covered with flames and thrashing madly at his robes as he burned. Smaller fires were burning on various paintings, chairs, and two of the couches.

Fortunately, he also saw that all the young battlemages had proven worthy of their training and reacted with alacrity in raising their own shields, as had the three other immortels. Everyone with the exception of Gabrien appeared to be unharmed. With a gesture, Theuderic extinguished the flames and wrinkled his nose at the scent of burned flesh mixed with smoke. But the old immortel’s screams continued.

A quick-thinking mage with black hair cast a
soporifique
spell on the badly burned sorcerer, who immediately slumped into blessed silence. But it was clear from a glance that the extent of his burns was too severe to survive. Standing directly in front of the crystal, now cracked and smoking, Gabrien had taken the full extent of a blast that had been hot enough to spark fires on the far side of the chamber more than forty feet away.

Theuderic helped Lithriel to her feet and was relieved to see that at least the old man’s death hadn’t struck her as amusing. And he doubted that her previous amusement would be held against her, not now that her astute perceptions had saved them all from Gabrien’s fate.

“Are you well?” he asked.

She nodded, but her eyes went quickly to the motionless body of the burned man, and she inhaled sharply. It appeared that even to the elvish sense of humor, death by dragonfire, when seen up close, was more hideous than hilarious.

Theuderic looked at Josce-Robinet, one of the three surviving immortels, and shook his head. The old sorcerer nodded, sighed, and kneeled down next to his unconscious colleague and placed a hand to his chest. “
De la cendre a la cendre
,” he said with a distinct note of irony in his voice. “The peace of
L’Immacule
upon you, Gabrien de la Poterrie.” He rose and brushed the charred ash from his hands.

Theuderic sighed too. He hadn’t much liked the cranky old immortel, but he mourned for the loss of arcane knowledge the man’s death represented. He had been one of the most respected immortels in the academy, and combined with the death of Narcisse, who had arguably been its foremost experimentalist, it was clear that L’Academie had suffered a grievous blow today.

And that was before taking into account His Royal Majesty’s fury at the loss of five of his precious battlemages. The King’s Own had not suffered such losses in a single day since the Duc d’Carouge had lost most of his army to a rampaging orc horde nearly fifty years ago. But although the duc’s defeat had cost the king nine battlemages, today’s debacle had added two immortels to the account.

And even though the mad idea of taming dragons had not been Theuderic’s, but rather had been the brainchild of the late Narcisse de Segrais and the Red Prince, it was not outside the realm of possibility that he might be held responsible. He was the one who had obtained the failed elvish spell that had been attempted today, after all. Such disastrous failure demanded a scapegoat, and since de Segrais was no longer in the running, and since the Red Prince was above all such recriminations, who else did that leave to face the wrath of the high council? Perhaps it was time to see about returning the Lady Everbright to her people.

He felt like laughing, felt like imitating Lithriel’s behavior. What an utter disaster! And yet, could it truly have ended any other way? How arrogant, how foolish they had been, to think that their learning and their art would suffice to bend the most powerful, most ancient, most magical beings in all Selenoth to their will!

He looked up and saw that Laurent was staring at him. The young mage looked as dazed as if he, and not the dragon, had been the one struck by lightning. It was a good thing the lad had scholarly instincts, because it was readily apparent that he wasn’t cut out for the violent vagaries of warfare. Laurent was destined for the academy, not the battlefield, if only he could survive long enough to claim a seat there.

“Remember,” Theuderic said to his younger colleague, “there is a gold coin in every coffin.” He clapped the young academicien on the shoulder and pointed to the smoking wreck of the cracked crystal. “Now that Narcisse and Gabrien are gone, that’s two more chairs L’Academie must fill. At this rate, I daresay you’ll find yourself an immortel by summer.”

THE SACRED COLLEGE

The princes of the Church gathered. Some wore black, their reddened eyes and somber miens indicating their depth of grief over the loss of the Sanctified Father. They knew their loss was Heaven’s gain, of course, for if ever a soul had labored long and hard for the Kingdom of God, if ever a man had run the good race and fought the good fight, it was the Sanctiff Charity IV.

Others were clad in their most elaborate vestments. And though they kept their expressions carefully guarded and appropriate to the solemn occasion, there was no mistaking the meaningful glances that were exchanged between one celestine and another in response to a greeting, a word, or even a simple nod.

The naming of the next Sanctiff was the holy burden of the Sacred College, but few would be so innocent as to deny that worldly ambition lurked in some of the hearts of the thirty-three men sworn to the service of God and Holy Mother Church. Some of them had been waiting a lifetime for this moment, had devoted their entire lives to ensuring that they would one day be here, in this humble wooden chapel that had been erected overnight by an army of priestly laborers, on such a day.

Here they would meet in conclave, thrice daily, until all were unanimously agreed upon a new Sanctified Father, who, by tradition, would be chosen from one in their midst. The process could take months. Once, following the untimely death of Righteous III, the bitter rivalry between Valerius Deprecatus and Severus Exigo had prevented anyone from being elevated to the Throne of the Apostles for eighteen months—until Exigo finally died of old age and Deprecatus triumphantly claimed his place as the 37th Sanctiff of Amorr. He was a man of great energy, as befitted a Valerian, and many historians considered it a pity that the conclave that preceded his reign had outlasted it by nearly a year.

The cerulengus rose wearily from his unpainted wooden throne at the right hand of the empty one painted white to symbolize the sacred bones of the
Sedes Ossus
. Of the thirty-three men present, only he could not be the man chosen to succeed Charity IV. As cerulengus, it was his role to secure the transition, not play the central role in it.

“We meet in sadness, but also in joy, my brothers,” he said. “Let us put aside all thoughts of ourselves, of our individual concerns, and our personal allegiances, and praise God that the Sanctified Father is safe in the bosom of the Immaculate, beyond every pain and every sorrow, encompassed in light and glory.”

“Heavenly Father, we praise You,” the celestines murmured.

“Let us thank the Immaculate, who intercedes for fallen Man, who died the death of a sinner though He himself was sinless, and who even now stands advocate for the Sanctified Father before the throne of the Almighty God.”

“Immaculate Son, we thank You.”

The cerulengus cleared his throat, which had started to crack a bit upon the word
advocate.
He looked around the room, from one celestine to the next, before proceeding.

“And let us beseech the Sacred Fire to descend upon us and grant us prudence, that we may choose wisely and well.”

“Sacred Fire, we beseech You.”

The cerulengus stood there for a moment longer, unmoving, his head bowed and his hands uplifted in silent prayer. But what more he asked of God, only he and the Almighty knew. Then he looked closely at a nondescript man of middling height, who was seated slouched upon his throne in a manner that bordered on insouciance given the solemnity of the occasion, before returning to his own chair.