Masques (37 page)

When she recovered, she felt the hard strength of Wolf’s thigh underneath her ear.

“I don’t know,” said Wolf, sounding vicious.

She blinked cautiously, and when her head didn’t fall off, she pushed herself up.

“Fine,” she told Wolf. “I’m fine. My fault.”

Sitting up, she could see what had happened. The spell was directional all right, but mostly in a forward and backward kind of direction rather than the direction of a loosed arrow. It had knocked down the floating stones in a wide “V” pattern, with Wolf at the apex. The stones directly to either side of where he’d been sitting were still floating, but every stone more than two feet in front of him was on the ground.

She had been sitting on the edge of the path of the spell, but apparently the fire pit hadn’t been far enough away.

“How long was I out?” she asked, noticing that her ears were buzzing and her balance was off. Even sitting flat on the ground, her upper body wanted to sway.

She was propelled down again with a none-too-gentle hand, as Wolf answered, “Not very.”

“How do you feel?” asked Myr, concern evident in his voice.

“Like the entire mercenary army of Sianim just got through marching over my head.” She closed her eyes and let herself enjoy their concern. She loved sympathy.

“Not too bad, then,” said Myr with evident relief.

“Not horrible, but not fun.” Aralorn decided that her headache had subsided enough she could open her eyes again.

“You need to try some magic,” Wolf said grimly.

She would have whined at him, but the hand on her shoulder was shaking a little. For Wolf’s sake, she called a simple light to her hand, then dismissed it.

“Wolf,” asked Myr, “do you think that the ae’Magi will let you complete the spell? It seemed to take a lot of preparation.”

“I won’t need to,” answered Wolf, relaxing against the wall of Haris’s former kitchen. His thumb ran over her collarbone, then stilled. “With a spell this simple, it’ll be easy enough to re-create the effect.”

His relief was more obvious in the amount of words that he was using to explain himself to Myr. “Once I see the pattern to push the magic into,” he said, “I don’t need the physical parts of the casting anymore. It really is something only a beginning magic-user would have created. Take all of the most common spell components mixed together, add the first five symbols learned in magic, and blow—poof: instant spell. What is really amazing is that it didn’t blow up in the apprentice’s face. It came uncomfortably close to doing that with me.” He tapped Aralorn’s nose in emphasis. “Next time I tell you to get behind me, get behind me.”

“What’s next?” asked Myr.

Wolf took off his mask wearily. In the bright light of the winter sun, Aralorn noticed the strain he’d been under written into the fine lines and dark shadows beneath his golden ambient eyes. “What else? I storm the castle of the ae’Magi and challenge him to a duel. Whereupon he engages me in best Aralorn-story-time fashion. Then either I win, and go down in history as the cruel villain who destroyed the good wizard, his father. Or he wins.” Wolf’s voice was coolly ironic.

“If he wins, what happens?” Aralorn spoke from her prone position and showed no intention of moving. “I mean, what is he trying to do? Why does he want everyone to love him?”

While he answered, Wolf played with a strand of hair that had worked its way out of her braid. “You asked me about that once before. I think I know the answer now.”

Myr sat down beside Wolf. “What? Power?”

“I thought that might be it at first,” Wolf said. “Maybe that was even the correct answer at one time. When I was his apprentice, that seemed to be it. He could link with me and use the power that I gathered for his own spells, much, I believe, in the same manner that he now uses the magic released by the deaths of the children he kills. But there was an incident that scared him.” For Myr’s benefit, Wolf briefly explained his destruction of the tower.

Myr whistled. “That was you? I’d heard a story about that, I’ve forgotten who told me. They said that the tower looked like a candle that someone forgot to blow out. The stone blocks looked like they melted.”

Wolf nodded. “He started to try using control spells on me, after that. I left before he had much success. But what surprised me was that he continued to try and get me back under his control. He’s been looking for me for a long time.”

He looked down at Aralorn. “If all he wanted was to kill me, he could have done that easily enough. Or at least come close. If it were only my power he wanted, then he’s wasted a lot more of it trying to find me than he could ever get from me. I am more powerful than most magicians, but Lord Kisrah is very strong as well, and the ae’Magi never attempted to tap into his magic. The magic that he gets from one of the children he kills is also probably more than he could get from me because my defenses are stronger.”

“Revenge, then?” suggested Myr. “Because he thought that he had you under his control and you escaped?”

“So I thought,” answered Wolf, “but then Aralorn told me that she thought that I was half shapeshifter and that some of the magic that I am using is green magic.”

Myr started. “Are you? That’s why you have so little trouble taking the shape of a wolf. I thought it was unusual.”

Wolf nodded. “Most of the magic that I use is human magic. Since I found out that I could use it, I’ve been trying to work with the green magic. It is bound by much stronger rules than what I’m used to; so, except for shapeshifting, I find it much harder to work. Even so, it might give me an edge over the ae’Magi.”

Wolf paused, then continued, “The question still remains, what does the ae’Magi want from me? He is a Darranian, and the animalism of having sex with a shapeshifter might appeal to him, but I couldn’t conceive that he would raise the resultant offspring as his own. Not until I realized that it might be the green magic that he wanted. Green magic that I didn’t use until I left his control.”

“But why green magic?” asked Myr. “I can’t imagine that he values shapeshifting that highly.”

“Healing,” said Aralorn softly—for the sake of her throbbing heart. Because the idea that Wolf had been leading them toward was terrifying.

Wolf nodded. “Exactly. As you told me, Aralorn, a shapeshifter can heal himself until he is virtually immortal. What I believe the ae’Magi hopes to do is to reestablish the link that he had with me and use green magic to give himself immortality. Until then, he can use standard magic to defeat the problems of aging, but that doesn’t make him young.”

“No point in ruling the world unless you have time to do it in,” offered Myr.

“Yes,” agreed Wolf. “There was another clue as well. Neither of you was particularly well acquainted with the Uriah as they were a few years ago. I was in the ae’Magi’s castle when he created the first of his, using his own spell. The Uriah that I knew then were barely able to function. They could not even understand speech as well as a dog can. Now, from what Aralorn says, he has some that even retain the memories of the person that they once were.”

“The Uriah in the swamplands were created during the Wizard Wars; they are close to being immortal,” commented Aralorn.

Wolf nodded. “They don’t die unless they are killed. If he could get them just a bit more pretty, he’d probably turn himself into one.”

Soberly, Myr said, “I don’t think that he ever intended to turn himself into a Uriah. I’ve known him for a long time, too. There is no way he would turn himself into something that by its very nature is a slave to its need for food—pretty or not. If a Uriah retains most of its personality, then it is possible that it also retains its ability to work magic. What if he wants to kill you, Wolf, and turn you into one of his Uriah, obedient to his command, but just as powerful as you have always been?”

“Oh, isn’t that a lovely thought,” said Aralorn.

Blank-faced, Wolf considered Myr’s comment. “I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll have to make sure that it doesn’t happen, hmm?”

There was a heavy silence, then Aralorn said in a bright tone, “Speaking of Uriah, do you realize what a mess we are going to have to clean up when the ae’Magi is dead and we have several hundred masterless Uriah roaming the countryside? Sianim is going to be making good money off this.

Wolf worked at the spell for days, until he could direct it better, but the force of the spell varied widely. Wolf muttered and finally even went back to mixing the powders, but the spell still wouldn’t stabilize. He told Aralorn he needed to try a few different herbs that might refine the reaction. He didn’t have all that he needed, so he left to do some trading in the south.

The sun was drifting toward evening, turning the peaks of the mountains red. Aralorn shifted contentedly on her rock near the cave entrance. Several days ago someone found a huge patch of berries, and the whole camp had spent the better part of two days harvesting the find. Haris had been adding them into everything and today had managed to cook several pies. Given that the only thing that he had to cook on was a grate over a fire, it was probable that he’d used magic to do it, but no one was complaining.

Licking her fingers clean of the last of the sweet stuff, Aralorn ran an idle gaze up the cliff face and caught something out of the corner of her eye. It was a shadow in the evening sky that was gone almost as soon as she saw it. She got to her feet and backed away from the cliff, trying to figure out just what it was that she saw, calling out an alarm as she did so.

The four or five people who were out milling about doing various chores started for the entrance at a run. Stanis and Tobin were coming up the trail to the valley with a donkey cart laden with firewood. Although they heard the alert, too, they weren’t able to increase their pace much because of the donkey, and they weren’t about to abandon the results of their labors.

Aralorn distractedly glanced at them, then looked back at the cliff, just in time to see the dragon launch itself. If she hadn’t caught the moment of launch, she probably wouldn’t have noticed it because it used magic to change the color of its scales until it blended into the evening sky. Aralorn headed for Stanis and Tobin as fast as she could. Seeing her, they abandoned the donkey and began running themselves. As she neared them, the shadow on the ground told her that the dragon was just overhead. She knocked both boys down in a wrestler’s tackle and felt the razor-sharp claws run almost gently across her back.

The dragon gave a hiss that could have been either disappointment or amusement, and settled for the donkey, which it killed with a casual swipe of its tail. As it ate, it watched idly as Aralorn drove the two boys into the cave and stood guard at the entrance.

Aralorn met its gaze and knew that her sword was pitifully inadequate for the task, even had she been a better swordswoman. She had some hope that the runes that had kept the Uriah at bay would do the same to the dragon, but dragons were supposed to be creatures of magic and fire.

She heard the sounds of running footsteps behind her, then Myr’s exclamation when he saw the dragon. He drew his grandfather’s sword and held it in readiness. Aralorn noted with a touch of amusement that his larger sword looked to be a much more potent barrier than her own.

“How big do you think that thing is?” asked Myr in a whisper.

“Not as big as it looked when it was over top of me, but big enough that I don’t want to fight it,” murmured Aralorn in reply.

The dragon paused in its eating to look over at them and smile, quite an impressive sight—easily as intimidating as Wolf’s.

Myr stiffened. “It understands us.”

Aralorn nodded reluctantly. “Well, if you have to die, I guess a dragon is an impressive way to go; maybe even worth a song or two. Just think, we are the first people to see a dragon in generations.”

“It is beautiful,” said Myr. As if in approval of his comment, a ripple of purple traveled through the blue of the dragon’s scales.