The Enemy Within (14 page)

Adolph barely acknowledged Jarla. He gave Dieter a glower.
“So. I hear you’ll try to teach us something tonight.”

“Yes,” Dieter replied. Mama Solveig had insisted on it.

“Something you found in the holy writings?”

“No.” The only new spell he’d discovered therein was the
charm of divination, and he didn’t dare share that one. Somebody could use it to
discover his true identity and intentions. “Something my father taught me.”

Adolph snorted. “Hedge magic.”

“All magic derives from Chaos and is accordingly sacred in
the eyes of the Changer of the Ways. But if you haven’t absorbed even that basic
truth, I suppose you can stay out here and drink cider.”

“Is that what you’d like me to do? Then I’m sorry to
disappoint you. I never neglect a chance to worship, and I won’t mind picking up
your little cantrip. It’s just that I’m disappointed. Mama told us to expect
miracles of you.”

Dieter was still trying to decide how to respond to the
sarcasm when Mama Solveig clapped her hands to attract everyone’s attention. The
drone of conversation died away.

“We’re all nine of us here,” she said, “so let’s begin.” She
opened a chest sitting atop a table. “Come put on your regalia.”

Said regalia proved to be tabards sewn from irregular scraps
of cloth, pink, puce and purple, primarily, garish as a jester’s motley. Only
Adolph’s costume deviated from the common mould. He reached into the box,
removed a black velvet cloak with a purple satin lining, shook it out, and
swirled it around his shoulders. The costly garment was an extravagance for a
fellow earning a journeyman’s wages, but apparently he imagined it made him look
like an adept.

When Mama Solveig revealed the shrine, the icon seemed to
pounce out of the dark. The writing on the parchments started to glow.

Prayer followed, and then the sacrifice of two young goats.
Adolph slit the throats of the bound, bleating kids and laid the bodies at the
foot of Tzeentch’s pedestal. Dieter felt a sudden elation and struggled to deny
it, to clear his mind, to be himself, and not the newborn other who continually
tainted his feelings and skewed his judgement.

“Now,” Mama Solveig said, “Dieter will teach us a spell.”

He’d pondered exactly what to impart. It shouldn’t be
anything the Red Crown could use to hurt others, or anything overtly evocative
of the powers of storm and sky. Adolph, Jarla and Mama Solveig had already seen
him use such abilities, but even so, he preferred not to provide any more reason
for people to suspect that he wasn’t a humble wyrd but rather a Celestial
wizard.

In the end, he’d decided on the simplest of spells, the charm
to make a handheld object shine with its own inner light. He started instructing
Mama Solveig, Jarla, Adolph and a boatman named Nevin as he’d once taught
apprentices of his own order. The remaining cultists supposedly lacked any trace
of mystical aptitude, and so they simply stood and watched.

To Dieter’s surprise, despite their lack of any clear,
comprehensive grounding in the theory of magic, his current pupils seemed to
catch on quickly. They’d plainly derived some benefit from their study of the
blasphemous texts, and learning a basic charm with the help of a competent
teacher was considerably easier than uncovering, comprehending and mastering the
complex hidden spells.

Finally the little pewter vial in Jarla’s hand radiated
silvery light. She stared at it in what seemed a combination of delight and
disbelief. “I did it! I did it the first of anybody.”

Dieter smiled. “Good for you.”

Adolph scowled and continued to scowl when the quill in his
own grasp and the objects in the hands of Mama Solveig and Nevin began to shine
white, yellow or blue. Oblivious to his displeasure, the boatman and Jarla
grinned and congratulated one another. Dieter gathered that their attempts to
learn magic generally ended in frustration, but tonight each felt like a genuine
magus.

When the lesson concluded, Mama Solveig beamed at her flock.
“This is splendid. As I’ve told you, nine is a sacred number, and the ideal
number for a coven. Now that we’ve completed our circle, it’s plain that we’ll
do great things. But it’s time to finish up for tonight, lest those who wait for
you at home wonder where you tarried so late. Dieter, will you read a
benediction from the holy texts? Whatever you choose will be fine.”

“I deliver the benedictions!” Adolph said.

“More often than not,” the old woman replied, “because my
bleary old eyes have trouble making out the characters, and you read well. But
so does Dieter, and the god loves change, so let’s give him a turn.”

Actually, Dieter, or at least the still-sensible part of him,
would have been happy to let Adolph do the reading. He didn’t want to subject
himself to the influence of the luminous words so soon after working sorcery,
even of the most benign and trivial sort. But he couldn’t think of a plausible
excuse to refuse.

He chose a rambling screed on the ultimate invincibility and
inevitable triumph of Chaos. So far, it had never fascinated him to the extent
that some of the other passages had. If he steeled himself against its
enticements and stopped after a few lines, maybe it wouldn’t be able to chip
away at him.

He began to read, and it was all right. The blasphemous words
sought to entrance him, but by now he and the texts were like fencers who
duelled one another every day. He’d learned their tricks, and the knowledge
aided his defence.

He reached the final syllables with his head still clear, or
as clear as it ever was anymore. Then Adolph cried out, startling him. He
faltered.

“Keep going!” Adolph snapped. He was all eagerness now.
Dieter realised that something hidden in the screed had begun to reveal itself
to him, and he was as avid as any magician on the verge of discovering a new
enchantment.

Dieter looked to Mama Solveig. “Yes,” she said, “keep
reading. We mustn’t waste the opportunity.”

That left him no choice but to continue. It was now more
difficult to hold himself aloof from the spiritual pollution implicit in the
text, because he was just as curious as Adolph to discover what secret lurked
encoded in the surface message. It would be even more poisonous, but what true
wizard could turn away from it?

He reached the end of the document. Adolph told him to start
over and he did.

The second time though, certain syllables started emphasising
themselves. He didn’t articulate them any louder, but they somehow resounded in
the mind. Stringing them together, knowing instinctively where the breaks ought
to occur, he constructed words of power. Other cultists cried out or laughed
crazily as they too glimpsed the hidden pattern.

“I’ve got it!” Adolph shouted. He snatched one of the staves
and brandished it over his head, an action that spread his handsome cloak like a
pair of wings. Evidently he meant to try the spell.

“Wait!” Dieter said. “We aren’t ready. We don’t understand it
yet.”

Adolph sneered. “Maybe you don’t, you and your stupid little
lights. I’ll show you some real magic.” He slashed the gleaming oak rod through
a mystic pass and uttered the first word of command.

Dieter hoped Mama Solveig would intervene, but she didn’t.
She and the other cultists simply watched, plainly apprehensive but eager for a
marvel as well, apparently trusting in Tzeentch to protect them. The icon’s
snarling grin seemed to stretch a little wider.

Adolph shouted the final word of the spell and thumped the
butt of the staff on the floor for emphasis. Power whined in a crescendo that
died abruptly.

For a moment it seemed that apart from the shrill noise,
nothing had happened. Then a sort of oval-shaped distortion, seething and
running with sickly colour, opened in empty air.

Hanno, the squat, grizzled cabinetmaker who fashioned the
cult’s wands and staves, stepped closer to peer at the writhing, floating
abnormality. “It’s a marvel,” he said in a bullfrog voice, “but I don’t
understand the use of it.”

Likewise rippling and oozing with colour, hands and forearms
shot up out of the oval as if it had become a hole into another world, as,
perhaps, it had. They grabbed Hanno and jerked him forwards. He screamed but
fell silent when his head disappeared into the opening.

No one else made a move as the woodworker’s kicking feet
disappeared through the wound in the fabric of reality. It had all happened too
quickly.

But then Dieter shook off his paralysis. He circled around
the lectern to a point from which he could look straight into the opening. He
thought he saw a human figure in the multicoloured churning, but it was small,
as if he was seeing it from far away. It floundered as though drowning, and
other shapes flitted around it like sharks closing in on an injured fish.

At least Hanno was still alive, for the moment, anyway.
Dieter wanted to rescue him, but didn’t know if he was up to the challenge. Had
he understood the enchantment Adolph had cast, it might have been easier, but
the imbecile had precluded that by acting so precipitously. Dieter drew a deep,
steadying breath, preparing himself to cast a counter spell, and then hands
seized him from behind. Arms wrapped around him and dragged him backwards.

He fought back, managing to grab the little finger of his
attacker’s left hand, bend it back, and snap it. That loosened the bear hug
sufficiently for him to twist and see who was grappling him.

A second tear had opened in midair, and another Chaos
creature had reached through, torso and limbs elongating to cover the distance
to its intended victim. Its head was vaguely lupine, and its six eyes flashed
like mirrors catching the sun. It snarled and struggled to squeeze Dieter into
immobility.

Fortunately, it didn’t seem to be any stronger than he was.
Perhaps the pain of its broken finger even hindered it a little. He wrenched his
right hand free and gouged one of its eyes with his thumb. That made it falter.
He hammered its snout with the heel of his palm, then tore free of its embrace.

It reached for him again, but he sprang back beyond its
reach. Evidently something constrained it from leaving the tear altogether;
perhaps the opening would close behind it if it did. It snatched for him again,
still falling short, and then he heard everyone else screaming.

He looked about. The scene was so frenzied it was difficult
to take it all in, but more rips had split the air, and it looked to him as if a
couple of other cultists had already been dragged into them. The rest struggled
against their attackers, using punches, kicks, knives and blunt instruments for
the most part, too panicked to think of attempting magic even if they were
capable of it.

Mama Solveig was an exception. She conjured coils of shadow
to bind one spirit, but a second burst from another hole, seized her by the
hair, and yanked her towards it.

A cultist bolted for the door, but new holes opened in front
of him to bar the way. New apparitions reached for him.

Hands grabbed Dieter’s throat and dragged him upwards like a
hangman’s rope. Strangling, he peered up to see that, its orientation more
horizontal than vertical, a rent had opened near the ceiling, and its inhabitant
had reached down to seize him. So far, though, it couldn’t quite muster the
strength to lift him into its domain. One moment, he was entirely off the floor,
but then the creature let him slip, and the toes of his flailing feet brushed
and bumped it once again.

He pounded, scrabbled, and tore at the apparition’s hands and
arms until it lost its grip. He dropped, then staggered out from underneath it.
Another creature lunged like a striking serpent, and he forced himself to
scramble on beyond its reach before pausing to gasp for air.

He saw that he couldn’t stay still for long. There were too
many tears, and more ripping open every moment. At least half the cultists were
gone, Mama Solveig included. Those who remained were threatened from every side.

A few paces away, Jarla and Adolph stood together. She
flailed at their attackers with one of the ritual staves. He cast splinters of
shadow from his fingertips. Then a gap opened right beside him, and a spirit
surged out of it. He hastily stepped behind Jarla. The creature grabbed her by
the shoulders and pulled her forwards.

Dieter rattled off an incantation and hurled darts of blue
light into the apparition. It vanished. Jarla staggered a step, then caught her
balance.

Dodging the hands that snatched for him, Dieter scrambled to
her and Adolph. “You conjured the enchantment,” he panted to the scribe. “Do you
have any notion at all how to dissolve or control it?”

Despite the dire circumstances, it took Adolph a moment to
admit he didn’t.

“Then the two of you keep the creatures off me,” Dieter said,
“while I see what I can do.”

He then visualised the sky, or projected a portion of his
consciousness there. For mystical purposes, it was the same thing. The stars
blazed, kindling flares of strength within his spirit, and the cold wind
whispered secret counsel. When he felt focused, calm, yet full to bursting with
power, he spoke the opening words of his incantation.

Meanwhile, Adolph and Jarla battled frantically.

Dieter reached the last syllable and swept his hands through
a final flourish. For a moment, the apparitions flickered, and he grinned—prematurely. The entities reasserted their hold on reality and came back on the
attack.

“It didn’t work!” Adolph cried.

He was right. Though it was one of the most powerful counter
spells the Lore of the Heavens had to offer, it hadn’t broken this particular
enchantment. Which meant only dark knowledge could save them now.

Dieter cast his thoughts over all the sickening, fascinating,
half-comprehended information he’d gleaned from the blasphemous texts, hideous
truths that, yielding to curiosity, he’d lapped up avidly and secrets that
forced themselves on his consciousness despite his attempts to resist. His
forehead throbbed in time with his pounding heart, and he shuddered as though
he’d imbibed some stimulant drug.