The Magicians' Daughter, page 36
Someone groaned. Reiffen, he hoped. With any luck, the Wizard was already dead.
“Reiffen?”
Heat and anger thickened around him. Hunger also, as bottomless as the Abyss. Hunger for rotting cattle and leverets by the shovelful, skinned and roasted. The pressure of it thrummed against his skull, like a beating heart that wasn’t his own. Its pulse thumped steadily against his skin, quiet and dangerous as a resting snake.
“Reiffen? If you’re here, you’d better answer. I can’t stay long.”
“Reiffen is here.” The Wizard’s voice poured over Avender from every direction.
“Where?”
“In front of you.” Fornoch coughed, his throat thick with phlegm. Or blood.
Avender slid his right foot forward until his toe encountered something solid. Crouching, he touched what he had found with his hands. Cloth and hair. Carefully he patted along Reiffen’s chest and shoulders. Nothing seemed wrong, until his fingers felt blood as thick as honey seeping beneath the ribs.
The pounding of the great heart quickened.
“Is he dead?”
“No.”
“What did you do to him?”
“Not what I intended.” The Wizard hacked again, longer and more wretchedly this time, as if his lungs were tearing. “I needed his Stone to save myself. You should be proud. A less skillful stroke, and I would not have had to avail myself of what your friend possessed.”
“You can’t blame me for this.”
“Did I say that? I apologize. That was not my intent.”
“Is he going to die?”
“Not if you leave him here. I will heal him when my strength returns. As it will soon.” Another cough, lighter this time, as if to prove the truth of what the Wizard said.
“If I take him outside, Ferris can help him.” The last thing Avender wanted was for Fornoch to be in charge of helping Reiffen.
“That is true. If you can take him outside. I lack the strength to stop you. And if I follow you, your friends would slay me in an instant.”
Avender tugged at Reiffen, but the magician didn’t budge. Dropping to his knees, Avender tried to lift him, but Reiffen was too heavy, as if his body was strapped to the floor. The great heart pulsed; unseen lungs swelled and tightened in time with Avender’s own.
He searched the darkness once more for the Wizard. “You’re doing this. Let him go.”
“I would if I could.” The Wizard coughed politely. “But it is not me. The mander senses the power Reiffen holds, and wants him for itself. Removing him will require more strength than you possess. A pity you did not bring Nolo. Though I doubt Nolo would have been able to pass the mirror.”
Reiffen groaned. He stirred in Avender’s hands.
“Avender, is that you?” Reiffen asked, his voice much weaker than the Wizard’s.
“Yes. Can you get up?”
“No.”
“You have to get out of here.”
“I know.” Reiffen’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Fornoch is using me for a shield. As long as I’m in here with him, he thinks you won’t smash the mirror.”
“Actually,” said the Wizard, the rasping in his voice almost completely gone, “I think just the opposite. Avender and his friends will find it much easier to smash the mirror than they believe. You have not been a particularly good friend to them over the last few years, Reiffen.”
Reiffen’s fingers closed tightly on Avender’s arm. Avender tried once again to lift him off the ground.
“Don’t leave me here, Avender. Please. I saved you once, remember?”
Yes, and all but killed him once, too. But Avender knew he couldn’t resist Reiffen’s plea, if only for Hubley’s sake. He had rescued him from Fornoch once, and would try to rescue him again.
A tug on the rope around his middle warned Avender that his time inside the mirror was up. He reached for Reiffen’s arm but, before he could get a solid grip, the bear had pulled him away. Spinning around, he tried to set his feet as he slid backward through the darkness, but there was no edge on this side of the mirror and he was pulled right through. Blinking at the sudden brightness, he tumbled out into the gloomy cottage. The pounding of the great heart disappeared.
“No!” he shouted. “I found Reiffen! You brought me back too soon!”
Ferris fell on her knees beside him. “Why didn’t you bring him with you?”
“He’s wounded. Fornoch took his Stone.”
“What does Fornoch want with his Stone?” The last bit of color drained from Ferris’s tired face.
“To try and save himself.”
Redburr padded forward, blood glinting in his eye. His breath reeked of fish and beer. “Your cut almost killed the Wizard, eh boy? Well, what are we waiting for? We still have another sword. Let’s go finish him off.”
Avender shook his head. “I don’t think we’ll find him. All I heard was his voice.”
“You found Reiffen. Why not the Wizard too?”
“Reiffen was lying at my feet, but I still might have missed him if Fornoch hadn’t told me where he was. You can’t see anything in there.”
“If you were that close to him,” asked Ferris, “why didn’t you carry him out?”
“Something’s holding him down. Fornoch, the mander, I don’t know what.”
Redburr snarled. “You saw the mander?”
“No, but I felt it. Almost like I was inside it. I could feel its heart beating, and its hunger.”
Redburr turned back to the mirror. Avender noticed Mindrell already standing on one side of the glass. “There’s only one thing left to do. Smash it.”
“But Reiffen’s still alive!”
The Shaper turned on him harshly. Flecks of white foam speckled his dark muzzle. Avender remembered the three or four times he had seen Redburr in a full-on rage. It wasn’t a pretty sight, whether you were on the Shaper’s side or not.
“You already talked me out of going back in there after the Wizard,” said the bear. “Do you want us to just wait out here till he gets better? Maybe he’ll let Reiffen go, but then what? Another thirty years playing with us like a cat with mice?”
Avender remembered the pleading in Reiffen’s voice, the fear he would be left behind. “What do you think?” he asked, looking at Ferris.
Her mouth set tight, Ferris took a long breath through her nose. The seeds of tears hovered at the edges of her eyes. “You’ve done everything Hubley and Giserre could ask. I lost him years ago.”
That was enough for the bear. Rearing up on his hind legs, he took hold of one side of the mirror. Mindrell put his shoulder to the other.
“Fornoch said we’d do this,” said Avender. “Which makes me think it’s just what he wants us to do.”
“Don’t think,” growled the Shaper. “That’s what he wants us to do. Anything to buy him more time.”
“Let me go in once more.”
“No,” said Ferris. “We have to do it now. The choice is mine.”
Taking Avender’s hand, she helped him off the floor. The Shaper and the bard each grabbed one side of the mirror and began to rock it back and forth. Even with the bear’s great strength, it took several shoves before they got the heavy glass swinging. A final push and the enormous mirror toppled backward with a crash. A pair of great cracks stretched from top to bottom. Carefully Mindrell tapped the broken pane with the toe of his boot. When his foot didn’t pass through, he picked up his heartstone sword and smashed the mirror completely, not stopping until the largest piece was smaller than his hand.
“That should do it,” he said.
A spider dropped from the roof at the end of a single silken line. Ferris leaned on Avender’s shoulder.
“I never even got a chance to talk to him,” she said.
He put his arm around her. She bent her head to his chest. Not since they had been children together had he held her so close. Smelling her hair, all their years together in Valing rushed back to him, the blue lake and the leaping nokken and the night raids stealing Enna Spinner’s maple candy. And Ferris scolding him and Reiffen every time they didn’t pay attention to her, or refused to take her with them, because she was a girl. Which hadn’t been often, because ignoring Ferris had always been harder than ignoring a summer storm. Reiffen had ruled them both, the uncrowned prince demanding their fealty with his daring and his family’s past. And now he was gone, like a barrel swallowed by the gorge.
Mindrell cleared his throat. “It might be a good idea to go to Issinlough.”
Pushing away from Avender, Ferris turned on the bard in fury. “Can’t you even give us time to grieve?”
“The rhymer’s right, Ferris.” Gently Redburr nudged her with his massive head, the redness already washed from his eyes. “The mirror’s smashed, but not the egg.”
Weariness settled over Ferris like a fog. “Right. I forgot about that.”
Avender remembered the angry hunger he’d felt inside the mirror. “The mander’s in there, waiting to be born. And I don’t think Reiffen’s going to be the one in control when it comes out.”
“I don’t have the strength to travel to Issinlough right now.” Ferris rubbed her forehead with the back of her hand. “I have to rest.”
“There isn’t time. Use your thimble to get us back to Tower Dale. One of the apprentices can take us on from there, but we have to get to Issinlough as fast as possible. We have to tell the Dwarves to break the egg.” Avender shook his head grimly. “You wouldn’t believe the power I felt in there.”
“All right.”
Rolling up her sleeves, Ferris held out her arms. The two men laid their hands on her left wrist, while the bear set his paw on her right. Clasping her hands together, Ferris removed the thimble.
“Return,” she said.
Hubley was waiting for them when they arrived.
Chapter 24
The Mandrake
Hubley didn’t feel any older after her father’s spell found her, but she did have to wrestle a bit with the thirty other versions of herself as they tried to order themselves in her mind. Each one thought it was her real tenth year and got very angry when the others tried to take over what it knew was its own proper place. Some wanted to be first, jostling for position right after her ninth birthday, while others fought to be last, trying to sneak in behind the current day. Hubley found it easiest to push the laggards away because she knew her memories were the most recent of any of them, but the earlier ones were harder to sort out. That was going to take some time.
Though her memories were unhappy and confused, Hubley herself was excited. Already she was seeing the snippets of magic her father had laid out for her over the years. None of them meant much on their own but, fitted together like puzzle pieces, they transformed into spells. Already she had discovered how to travel without falling asleep, and how to direct the spell to take her where she wanted. Who knew what else she would find wrapped up in the past, once she had the time to look for it.
Unfortunately, there were other things to do first. Her father had planted some very pressing memories in her mind in each of the last twenty years; apparently the whole idea of giving the last thirty years back to her was part of his plan to fight the Wizard. “You’ll find the two halves of the firestorm spell in every other year,” he had said in the most recent one, “and there’s a decent disease in there I just developed. If you catch Fornoch off-guard you might be able to kill him before he has a chance to do anything else.”
So much for that idea. Her father hadn’t anticipated her being stolen by someone she didn’t want to kill. She’d have to mention that particular flaw in his plan to him after her mother and Avender brought him back from the Wizard.
Giserre returned with a nightgown, and Hubley allowed herself to be taken out of the bath and toweled dry. Even letting her grandmother tuck her into bed was easier than trying to explain what had happened. Giserre was no mage. But deciding to stay and watch Hubley sleep as well was a little much, so Hubley cast a quick spell that put her grandmother to sleep instead. After that she was free to move through the tower, as long as she stayed invisible. Secretly borrowing a dress from the same cook’s daughter who had already lent her the nightgown, she found an apprentice with a thimble and compelled him to take her to the Tower’s room of return. After a fight with Fornoch, her mother and father would most likely come back by thimble rather than ordinary spell.
Her suspicions were correct. “Where’s Father?” she demanded when she saw he wasn’t with them.
Ferris and Avender exchanged glances. The bear licked at a spot on the floor.
“We’re hoping to meet your father in Issinlough,” said Mindrell while everyone else was still deciding what to say.
“That’s right,” added Avender quickly. “We have to go right away. There’s no time to even tell you what happened.”
Hubley knew both men well enough to know they weren’t telling her the whole truth. “You didn’t rescue him?”
Her mother hugged her close. Hubley didn’t think she’d ever seen her so weak and tired. Her cheeks were hollow, her eyes shrunk deep behind her nose.
“It’s too complicated to explain, sweetheart,” she said. “I’ll tell you everything when I come back.”
“I’m going with you.”
Her mother patted her absently on the head. “No you’re not. It’s too dangerous.”
“I am too. You’re too tired to do the spell. I’ll have to do it.”
“Hubley, I think you need to go back to bed. You’re not making any sense. Avender told me you can only cast the traveling spell when you’re asleep. And how’d you get down here, anyway?”
“I made Delmanour bring me. I’m not a child any more, Mother. Father freed my memories. All of them. His spell only just reached me, but I remember everything now. He told me all about his plans, too.”
Redburr padded forward. “Plans?”
“His plans to kill Fornoch if the Wizard ever captured me. That’s what he was teaching me all these years. With what I know now, I could’ve escaped easily. Or I might even have slain the Wizard, if I caught him by surprise.”
“But you weren’t taken by Fornoch,” said Ferris.
“Father didn’t know that. He didn’t know anything about Mims, so he cast the spell anyway just to be safe.”
“This is all very interesting,” interrupted Avender, “but we don’t have time to talk about it now. What’s important is to get to Issinlough. Hubley, can you really take us there?”
“Yes. Father taught me parts of the traveling spell several times. Now that I have all my memories again, I’ve already put the spell back together.”
Ferris interrupted firmly. “Innich can take us. This is no time—”
Redburr cut her off. “Let the cub come. We’re in a hurry, and it’ll take time to find Innich. Hubley’s obviously not what she was when we left, Ferris. And she’ll be just as safe in Issinlough as here. Safer, even, with a couple hundred Dwarves around.”
“If she’s really got thirty-one years worth of magic in her,” Avender added, “she’s probably better suited to this sort of thing than we are.”
Ferris gave in wearily. Hubley held out her hands. The magic her father had given her brought with it not only knowledge and power, but confidence as well. She could take them wherever she wanted.
For now, that was Mother Norra’s kitchen. Mother Norra was long gone, of course, which brought Hubley a twinge of sadness. Her Mims and Grandpa were probably gone as well, but she didn’t have time for mourning anyone yet. Her father had a great deal to answer for once things were more settled.
“What’s next?” she asked.
Avender nodded toward the window. Outside, a long airship slipped gracefully past the thick finger of the Halvanankh, the Bryddsmett at the end of its three blumet cables gleaming below. The manderstone, ten times larger than Hubley remembered, stood at the center of the bowl.
“Your father and Fornoch are trapped inside.”
Her mother told her everything that had happened at the Wizard’s cottage as they climbed to the top of the unneret, and how Fornoch had said he would heal her father. All that was left now was to see who would be in control of the mander after it hatched. Hubley could tell from her mother’s sagging shoulders that she thought it was going to be Fornoch. The idea that her father was stuck inside some horrible beast was terrible, but still, he was her father. Why shouldn’t he be the one who survived? He’d gotten away from the Wizard often enough before.
They sent the first humans they met off to find Dwvon and Uhle. “Tell them to meet us in the Bryddsmett,” Redburr growled. “It’s important.”
At the top of the city they crossed a pair of shining bridges to the Halvanankh, then descended the long finger of stone. At the lowest windows they unfurled rope ladders and climbed down the last eight or nine fathoms to stand beside the manderstone.
Hubley’s first impression had been right: the egg was enormous. The last time she had seen it, the stone had been shorter than she was. Now it loomed four or five fathoms above her head. Standing on its rounded end, it towered higher than the last blumet bench that circled the upper edge of the mett.
“At least it hasn’t started to hatch,” said Avender.
Following his lead, everyone put their ears to the stone. It was warm to the touch, and from within came a distant, hollow booming.
“Are Father and the Wizard fighting?” asked Hubley.
“I think it’s the creature’s heart,” said Avender.
Fur rose on the back of the Shaper’s neck and shoulders.
“Let’s get it up on the edge of the mett.” Leaning with one hand on the stone, Avender pointed back up the rows of silvery benches. “If we find out it’s Fornoch, we push it over.”
“And if it isn’t?” asked Ferris.
“Push it over anyway,” growled the bear.
“Why don’t you go turn into a bat or something,” said Ferris. “You’re not helping at all. You know we’ll make the right decision when the time comes.”
