Magic Zero

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Epilogue

Dragon Secrets
Excerpt

About Thomas E. Sniegoski and Christopher Golden

For Nicholas, Daniel, and Lily

—C. G.

For Harry and Hugo, the gods of bacon and good times

—T. S.

Our eternal gratitude to Connie and LeeAnne, for putting up with us. To Mulder, for puppy love. Special thanks to Lisa Clancy, without whom this series would not have gotten off the ground, and to Samantha Schutz, for imagination and enthusiasm. Thanks also to Mom and Dad Sniegoski, Dave Kraus, David Carroll, Paul Griffin, Bob and Pat, Flo and Jon, and Tim Cole and the usual lunatics. To Mom and Peter, Jose Nieto, Bob Tomko, Amber Benson, Rick Hautala, Allie Costa, Peter Donaldson, and Ashleigh Bergh.

CHAPTER ONE

T
he city of Arcanum was in mourning. Black bunting unfurled from open windows, and the flags of every magical guild had been lowered to half-mast. The ghostfire that burned inside the city’s spherical street lanterns had been altered in hue; once golden, it was now scarlet, and would remain so for one full week. Many shops and offices were closed, and thousands of the city’s mages had turned out to observe the funeral pyre that raged in the center of Temple Square—all to witness the ritual burning, all to mark the passing of Argus Cade.

In that grieving city, very few others were out and about this night, and those who were gave no notice to the ornate silver carriage that swept through the streets. It floated silently along, crimson lantern light splashing upon its surface, taking the twists and turns of its route with a deftness that revealed the skill of its driver. The silver vehicle
whispered through the city several feet above the cobblestones. The carriage doors were emblazoned with a lion about to pounce, the family crest of its occupant. At each of the four corners of the carriage was an image of a silver dragon curled in a mysterious repose.

Perched upon the carriage’s high seat was a man draped in deep blue robes, a heavy veil covering his face. His hands were held out in front of him and from his fingertips tendrils of crackling cobalt energy sparked toward the ground far below, fingers of cerulean fire investigating the road ahead of the carriage. He was a navigation mage, just as his father had been, two generations spent perfecting the sorcery of transportation. It was a worthy endeavor. Honest work for an honest man.

Inside the vehicle was Leander Maddox, the man whose family crest adorned its doors. The carriage made the slightest of hums—generated by the navigator’s magic—but it was little more than white noise to him. Leander was lost in thought, adrift in the aching sadness left behind in the wake of the death of his mentor and greatest friend. He forced himself to focus on the task that lay before him.

As Argus Cade’s apprentice, it fell to him to close down the old sorcerer’s residence and to collect whatever papers or journals he might have left behind.

“Argus,” Leander whispered to himself, raising a massive hand and covering his face with it. A sigh escaped him and he shuddered, settling more deeply into the velvet seat within the carriage.

The loss pained him deeply. Argus Cade had been the greatest sorcerer of his generation, a master of the magical sciences, an adviser to kings and prime ministers, but to Leander all of those things paled beside the man’s kindness and courage. He had been more than a mentor. He had been an example.

Leander had lost his own father as a boy, and Argus had always given him the guidance he would have wished for from a father. And in the midst of the political games and power struggles of the Parliament of Mages, Argus had never compromised his beliefs, never allied himself with anyone who did not share them, and never kept silent to avoid controversy. He was his own man, and had earned great respect for that position.

Leander glanced out the window at the street lanterns, scarlet ghostlights throwing red shadows on the nearby homes and shops as the carriage climbed through the winding street that led up into August Hill, the most exclusive neighborhood in Arcanum. How often as a young man had he trod the cobblestones and steps of this hill on his way to Argus’s home? Still each doorway, each sign hanging outside the window of a pub, was familiar.

The navigator slowed the carriage as the street twisted once more, rising up toward the pinnacle of August Hill, where homes hung alongside the ground itself, magic woven into every bit of architecture to keep them aloft. Lower down, the buildings were constructed upon the ground, but as the terrain became steeper, the houses were merely
anchored to the earth, jutting out at level angles from the side of the hill.

The sadness in his heart made Leander close his eyes again. He had been here only three nights past . . . the very night that Argus had died. With his eyes closed he could not stop his mind from slipping back in time, from reliving again those tragic final hours of a great man. Argus had been in his bed, the lamps burning low, a gloom settling upon his chamber. He had always been thin, but Argus had become almost skeletal. His long, hooked nose even more prominent than usual, jutted from his sallow, weathered face.

From time to time Argus would open his eyes and there would be a light in them, a spark, and he would laugh and reminisce about the days when he had first met Leander. As a professor at the University of Saint Germain, Argus had taken the burly, leonine man under his wing, and when they were seen together, other mages would remark on what an odd pair they made.

In later years, well after the death of Argus’s beloved wife, Norah, the mage had grown withdrawn, keeping his own counsel, and allowing only Leander into his private thoughts. Other than his household servants, the outside world saw Argus only rarely, though he made his opinions known to Parliament and to the heads of the guilds often enough. Leander was a professor at the university himself, now, in the very chair Argus had once held. He had been the great sorcerer’s student, his apprentice, and his only real friend.

Leander felt blessed to have had Argus Cade in his life.

But there were things other than grief haunting him now, though all of them connected to Argus’s death. Not all of the old mage’s ramblings had been sensible, not all of them accompanied by that spark in his eyes. Indeed, some of the things he had said as his spirit was slipping away, as his body and mind were failing him, had confounded Leander greatly.

The hum of the carriage grew louder and the world outside its windows darker, with only the faintest hint of red hues. There were only a few homes this high upon August Hill and, this far from the ground, it required great effort and magical skill for the navigator to carry them here.

Leander barely noticed. His thoughts had been in turmoil ever since Argus’s death, but in among that jumble there was something more subtle that was bothering him. Though it was nonsense, it haunted him more with each passing hour.

In his rambling Argus had said things that were . . . simply impossible. The ravings of a fevered brain.

They
had
to be.

Several times Argus had seemed to be on the verge of sleep, eyelids fluttering, only to have his eyes snap open and stare into the dim bedchamber and to whisper, as if afraid someone would hear:

“The boy. I must see to the boy.”

At the end, when every breath came in a rattling rasp and seemed likely to be his last, the old sorcerer had let his head loll to one side and, spying Leander, had thrust out a hand and clutched his arm with a ferocious, preternatural strength.

In that moment, though he had tried to deny it to himself,
Leander had seen utter clarity in Argus’s eyes. Total focus.

“Timothy,” the old man had rasped. “I have kept him well hidden these years, but the secret must be revealed now. To you, Leander, and only to you. You must promise to look after him. ’Pon this one thing more than any other, I must have your vow.”

Despite the clarity he saw in Argus’s eyes, Leander had told himself that it must be the nearness of death talking. Norah Cade had died while giving birth to their only child, Timothy, and the trauma of his entrance into the world had been too much for the infant; Timothy himself had died within an hour of his mother. It seemed to Leander that Argus had woven an intricate fantasy for himself in which the boy had lived.

Argus had been dying, and all Leander had wanted was to comfort him. The aged mage had asked for his vow, and to give him solace Leander had agreed, promising that he would look after Timothy as if the boy were his very own son.