Chapter 10
The lock rattled again before sunrise. It was probably the slaves bringing Thera her breakfast.
The night before she had stuffed her pockets full of naan so she’d have something to eat while crossing the wilderness, and most importantly she’d gotten a decent edge on her improvised blade. It was nothing to be proud of, but it was thin enough to slip between ribs and sturdy enough not to snap on the first thrust. She’d use some excuse to close the distance, surprise the wizard, stab him a few times, and then flee. Simple.
Only it wasn’t the young wizard at the door this time, but the far more dangerous Sikasso. At least she assumed the younger one was less deadly. It seemed like magic was the sort of thing where experience mattered more than physical strength.
“Good. You already have your boots on. We’re going on a walk.”
“Oh?” A different wizard didn’t change her plans. At least he was alone, so there would be no slaves calling for help.
“It’s good you have fashioned yourself a little knife and hidden it up your sleeve. It can be dangerous outside these walls.”
Now that changed her plan. “How did you know?”
“You are in my house now, Thera. I see everything. You should know it insults me as a host that you would doubt my ability to keep you safe from harm.” His voice grew cold and dangerous. “Leave it.”
Thera sullenly pulled out her shiv and dropped it on the bed.
Sikasso had a malicious smile. “Don’t worry. I have not taken offense. Only those who show initiative ever successfully learn to use magic. Now come along. It is not far, though if you get hungry you can always snack on some of that bread in your pockets.”
Thera followed Sikasso. It was the first time she saw what was beyond her room. The walls were stone, but uniformly fitted and polished better than in any warrior’s keep. The floors were hardwood, with different colored rugs every few feet. Her room had not been an anomaly. There was art everywhere, tapestries, paintings, and sculptures—some of which were far too big to steal easily. There were many other rooms, some doors open, revealing more rooms like hers, some closed, their contents a mystery.
The building was not nearly as large as the great house in Kanok, but if anything, it was finer.
They reached a large central hall. From up on the balcony, Thera could tell this was where the wizards dined, and home to even larger pieces of statuary. There was a great fireplace big enough to cook a whole cow in…She wasn’t sure these wizards ate beef, traditionally some houses didn’t care for it, but regardless, they could fit one in there if they wanted. A fire was going inside, sufficient to ward off the chill.
Adorning the walls were faded green banners featuring a red symbol which Thera had never seen before. These were obviously old, tattered and stained. A few of them even looked as if they’d been scorched in a fire.
“Who does that symbol represent?”
“House Charsadda.”
“Never heard of it.”
“Few have. That was what the Capitol wanted. It wasn’t enough for us to be destroyed, but also removed from history. The judges are very good at erasing the past.”
Houses were defeated, but they never really went away. Their people and holdings would be taken over by another. She knew that life well. “It’s a vassal now then?”
“Like your own family, Vane, was conquered by the Makao long ago? Houses come and go, gobbling each other up, or civil wars split them in two, but this was nothing of the sort. When we fell, no neighbors wanted to take this place over. It was a house of lepers, and the others wouldn’t risk contamination.”
That made no sense to someone raised by warriors. When borders changed, new territory was valuable, and the towns inside, their workers could be taxed in exchange for protection. “Surely someone claims this land?”
“By the lines on a map, yes, though only wild men and feral beasts live nearby. Here? This house, once the seat of our power, it was to remain abandoned. To the Capitol we were a piece of gangrenous flesh, amputated, and the stump cauterized with a branding iron…” Sikasso paused, frowning. “Strange. I’ve used that analogy while showing people around many times before, but this is the first time I’ve been able to understand such pain on a personal level. It…hurts.”
She hurried and changed the subject from the wizard’s missing limb before it put him in a fouler mood. “You have a beautiful home.”
“It has taken great effort. When our house fell, the only thing left standing of this place was the walls.” Looking smug, Sikasso led the way down the curving stairs. “We may have been forsaken by the Capitol, but my predecessors decided there was no need to live as barbarians. What you are seeing now is the result of five generations of repair and rebuilding.”
Thera understood money better than most from her caste, because she’d spent the last few years of her life stealing it in order to survive. What she was seeing here indicated a vast amount of wealth. “You make your way as assassins. Good money in that, I take it?”
“Not everyone can afford to pay us in black steel, yet there is always demand for our services. There are other forms of compensation.”
Thera knew a man’s life was only worth however many notes it took to bribe an untouchable to stab him. “You didn’t build this palace off murder alone. Killers come cheap.”
“We don’t.”
“What makes you so valuable?”
“That requires a broad answer,” Sikasso said as they reached the main floor. “If you need a wizard to do something inside the bounds of the Law, there are far more economical options than the Lost House. Outside the Law, however, when powerful men need things done in secret, no one else can offer what we can. Enough talk of business, I must show you something.”
As they walked along, Thera was able to figure out what was bugging her about this place. The building was large, but felt relatively empty, more museum than home. She saw two or three of the silent slaves, heads shaved and clothes plain, for every person she suspected from their finer dress was a wizard. Those all seemed to watch her suspiciously. None acknowledged her, but all of them were deferential toward Sikasso.
It took her awhile to realize that all of the wizards were men. The only other women she saw were among the slaves. There were no children at all. Did the wizards keep their families elsewhere? But before she could ask, they had reached the main doors.
In a normal estate of this size, warriors would have been obligated to guard such doors, but these wizards didn’t seem to have any warriors. Maybe they thought they were too good for her old caste? Sikasso casually waved his hand toward the doors and they were flung open as if by a mighty wind. Thera corrected herself. They definitely thought they were too good for the warriors.
Outside the world was wrapped in a thick gray fog. Frogs croaked and unfamiliar insects buzzed. She could barely see the tops of the trees—old, wispy things—and glowing bugs flying between them. There was a cobblestone path lit with glowing braziers burning every twenty feet. Sikasso began walking down the illuminated pathway. It was chilly out, so Thera pulled her coat tight about her. She still didn’t know where in Lok she was, but if the whole region was cloaked in this damnable fog, it would make navigating difficult. Though it would make escape easier, assuming wizards didn’t have a way to see through it.
When she turned back to look at the great house, it was a solid construction, but nothing that could resist a siege. It looked like there had been more walls once, but they were toppled now. A few towers rose through the mist, but they were broken and covered in moss. “You’ve no outer defenses.”
“We’ve no need. The only things we have to defend ourselves from here wouldn’t be stopped with mere walls.”
The stones were also covered in moss, so their steps were muffled. Everything here seemed soft and green. They walked through the mist for a few minutes, before Sikasso asked, “Do you know how magic really works?”
“I’ve seen what it can do.”
“I’m not speaking of the effect, but how it is accomplished. Do you know what magic is?”
“Magic is just magic.”
“Only a simpleton defines a word with that same word. Don’t be a simpleton.” Sikasso halted in a slightly wider spot in the road. “Magic is all about energy and elements, force and patterns. Look around you. Air, earth, life. What you see is not really what it is. The whole is constructed from various elements, billions of tiny pieces, smaller than the eye can see, compacted together to form different types of matter.”
All Thera could see was fog. It smelled like rotting plants. “Sure.”
“Magic is simply a different kind of matter, also made up of minuscule elements, only it is unique in that it can be controlled by one who has the will to do so. All matter exists in various patterns. Magic simply allows me to direct it into a new pattern.”
As Sikasso spoke every one of the lanterns went out, plunging them into darkness.
“What’s happening?”
“I have taken us outside the waking world so you can see things as they truly are.”
Thera didn’t move. It was black as coal. She could no longer feel the clammy fog clinging to her skin or hear the frogs or smell the decay. There was nothing at all. All she could hear was the pounding of her heart. Sikasso had killed more than the lights. It was as if he’d closed off the entire world. She was afraid to move. If she took a step would she become lost?
Except the wizard’s voice still reached her. “We are now outside the patterns. A useful space for when I wish to travel somewhere without being seen, or walk through a wall, or bypass a lock, but that’s not why I brought you here. This is a test to find out if you can see magic at all.”
She couldn’t see a damned thing, and frankly it was terrifying.
“Most can’t. Open your mind to the world around you. If you were born with the gift, then you will be able to sense the patterns. In order to change the structures you must understand them first.”
She tried, she really did, but it was like being buried alive. “I’ve got nothing.”
“You have no inclination toward wizardry. Unfortunate.” Sikasso then demonstrated that he was no regular teacher. “If you can’t, then I suppose I’ll just have to sell you to the Inquisition.”
That was almost as scary as being stuck on this…outside. She thought about lying, and declaring that she could see, but then he’d probably ask her to describe it, and her lies would fall apart.
Then Thera could vaguely sense something. She couldn’t see it exactly, but it felt like it was there. Only it wasn’t here, it was back in the waking world. She couldn’t tell what it was, except that it felt old…and dangerous. It felt like she’d walked into a cloud of molten sparks. “There’s something coming, Sikasso. Take us back. Take us back now!”
“Ah, you’re not completely blind then after all. One of the Dasa has sensed us and come to investigate. Back in the waking world all it will see of you is a shadow. When the superstitious cry about seeing ghosts from the corner of their eye, they probably caught a glimpse of a wizard skulking through this realm.”
The cloud of sparks was hovering over her. Past that was a heat, like an open flame, no, more like a blacksmith’s forge, hot enough to soften steel. It seemed more curious than malevolent, but she feared that was about to change. “Let me go!”
“Alas, I have twisted the world into this state, but I have no more magic left to get us out.”
As the heat closed in, Thera closed her eyes, but that made it no darker. “Surely you’ve got some demon on you.”
“I was curious if you became desperate enough, if you could call upon your magic to set you free.”
She suspected the Voice was worthless for that, as it had never helped, only caused her trouble and then left her stranded in dangerous situations. “You’re a liar. Even if I could, I might free myself and leave you trapped. You’d have brought magic at least enough for yourself.”
“See? I knew you weren’t a simpleton.” As Sikasso said that, her senses quickly returned. The lights flickered back into existence. Insects chirped. The smell of a swamp assaulted her nose.
And a monster was standing right in front of her. Thera gasped in surprise, reached for a dagger that wasn’t there, and nearly tripped over her own feet as she tried to get away. She crashed against the nearest pole, causing the brazier to tip.
The creature was the size of a man, but built like someone had draped a blue sack over a skeleton and then pulled it tight. It had a head, but no face. No mouth, no nose, just an indent where eye sockets would have been in a skull. The creature was dressed in unfamiliar armor made of round plates connected by mail, and it carried a battle axe in its thin blue hands. The steel was speckled with rust.
“Demon!”
“Hardly. It’s merely one of our Dasa, a guardian servant…Continue your patrol.” Sikasso made a dismissive gesture, and the thing began shuffling away.
“What sort of witchcraft is that?” As she asked that, she realized she must have sounded like Ashok.
“They are a relic from the old days, before the Age of Kings even. The template to create them has long been lost to us. They are resilient, but there are very few left in the world. Sometimes one is found inert in an ancient ruin, and fools smash them open to get the chunk of black steel inside, but we pay a good price for them to be brought here instead. Once agitated, they are far more dangerous than they appear…I suppose they’re like a wizard in that way.”
She watched in stunned disbelief as the thing plodded off down the path back toward the house. “Is it alive?”
“No more than a worker’s machine made of gears and levers is alive. It is powered, and thus moves. They neither eat nor breathe. They have no desires or intellect beyond that required to obey basic commands.”
She’d been raised to mistrust magic. They had no use for a wizard’s tricks in Vane. The darkness and the monster had unnerved her more than she wanted to let on. It was a lot to take in so quickly. She wanted to get out of this nightmare place. “Is that what you wanted me to see?”
Sikasso smiled. “Neither of those were the purpose of our little walk, just distractions along the way. No, come. It is a bit further.”
Now chilled to her core, Thera followed him in silence. So wizards could see all those little bits that made up the patterns of everything, but for her to see anything at all it had taken a walking relic with black-steel guts to be breathing distance away. Earlier she’d been worried about escaping through the fog, but the Dasa didn’t even seem to need eyes to see, and had found her when she wasn’t even really there. When Sikasso said it obeyed commands, she was certain he wasn’t talking about hers. The presence of the guardian servant complicated matters, but that didn’t mean that escape was impossible.
Sikasso seemed to be enjoying their stroll and one-sided conversation. “You asked earlier about how I change form? Those are simply other templates we’ve mastered. The bird, the snake, the swarm, the tiger, and more, all of those were handed down by the ancients. The elements that make up my body are redistributed accordingly. Yet each time, there is a cost. When we use magic, some fraction of it is consumed in the process. The tiny particles do their work, then expire. The greater the feat, the further you shift the pattern, the more magic dies.”
That she knew. There was a good criminal trade in demon parts. “Which is why the things that hold it are so costly.”
“It’s simple economics. Great demand, limited supply. Real magic comes from only two known sources, black steel and demons. The uneducated call the fire and thunder the fanatics of Fortress make magic, but they’re simply utilizing natural processes. Black steel is finite and irreplaceable. What the ancients left behind is all there is, but it is dense with extremely powerful magical elements. The magic harvested from sea demons is weaker, but replaceable, albeit with extreme difficulty.”
“I’d guess it’s a bit harder than shearing a sheep.” Thera laughed.
Sikasso did not. “And now there is a possible third kind…We have arrived.”
The cobblestone path abruptly ended at a chasm. It dropped a long way, and the bottom was obscured by the mist. The ground seemed torn, as if there had been a violent upheaval which had split it apart long ago, but now every edge had been softened by moisture and moss. Due to the fog, Thera couldn’t see what was on the other side.
Then she heard a distant, rhythmic noise that made her stomach clench with dread. She had not heard that sound for a long time.
The crashing of waves. The smell of salt.
“Are we by the ocean?”
Sikasso gave her a grim smile as he sat on a nearby rock. “Now you will see why you shouldn’t be so quick to refuse my protection.”
The sun was just beginning to appear, the top of an orange ball over the too-flat horizon. The fog glowed with reflected light. It took a while, but Sikasso seemed to be enjoying her growing discomfort. She watched in horror as the sun gradually burned away the mist. They were on a cliff top, overlooking hell itself.
To the east was the sea, vast, unending, and filled with evil. She began to catch glimpses of other buildings, but they were ruins, fallen towers and broken walls that had collapsed during whatever cataclysm had torn this ground apart. Then with a gasp she realized that some of the rocks that were splitting the waves below were actually the roofs of now submerged buildings. The land to the north of them was visible now, and it was water and marshes as far as her eye could see.
The palace that had become the House of Assassins had been built on a bluff overlooking a city. They were standing on the only part that hadn’t been flooded.
“The other sides are the same.” Sikasso could tell exactly what she was thinking. “And it is as infested with submerged demons as you imagine. There are a few safe paths through the flooded forest to get back to the Law-abiding world, but you would never find them on your own.”
Demons were a nearly unstoppable force of hunger and destruction. Pass too close to a lurking one, and you’d be torn to pieces and crammed into its jaws before you even knew it was there.
“No whole man would willingly live this close to hell. What is this place?”
“Before the demons rained from the sky, man crossed the sea in mighty ships. This city was what they called a port. The ocean was not always this close. The ancients had built dams big enough to control the flow of the River Nansakar, and levees, canals, and huge walls that held back the sea. Even after the demons turned the ocean into hell, long after every real ship in the world had been rent apart by their claws and sent to the bottom, man still lived here. It was said it was too beautiful to abandon.
“We survived here for centuries, but when the combined wrath of the Capitol was brought to bear against us, even the earth trembled at their will. They shattered those ancient dams, the waters came rushing in, our people were devoured by demons, and House Charsadda was consumed by hell.”
Thera shuddered at the thought. Over the last few years she had spent a great deal of time on the rivers of Lok, far more than any whole man would consider sane, and was even brave enough that she had learned to swim, but that was in fresh water, and only a long way from the sea. It was rare for a demon to travel very far up a river, but entering salt water meant almost certain death. She’d only been in the ocean once, briefly, and that trespass had nearly cost her life.
“What crime was so terrible for your people to enrage the Capitol so?”
“The Law cannot tolerate equals, only subjects…But the past isn’t why I brought you here, Thera Vane. You need to understand there is no reason for you to continue damaging my furniture, snapping off pieces to fashion into knives. Attacking my people is futile. There is no escape, because there is nowhere to escape to. Fulfill your bargain, and after that I will guide you through the flooded forest. Until then we will show you how to use magic. You saw the Dasa, so you’ve got some minor ability. Perhaps learning to control traditional magic will enable you to unlock this third source.”
“Me? You would teach me to be a wizard.”
“I have more important duties. I will obligate someone else to be your teacher. Be warned, many of my brothers disagree with my decision. They think we should have already sold you to the Inquisition, or that we should simply avoid any risk, kill you, and be done with it. It is only by my whim you still live.”
Thera stepped to the edge of the cliff and looked down at the ruins far below. “And if I can’t learn?”
Sikasso was completely sincere yet threatening at the same time. “Then it would be better to leap over the side now and spare yourself the suffering.”