The Archimage Wars: Wizard of Abal (10 page)

Bartholomew refilled his glass without
comment from a crystal decanter.

Hydan said, “Hey, try some of this,
it’s really exquisite!”

But I was right to business, and asked
Bartholomew, “Has Fiona returned?”

He shrugged, “No, I’m sorry, and I’m a
bit worried.”

“
Don’t be,” Hydan said,
having once again downed his snifter in a gulp, and was gesturing
for a refill. “She’s a Second, not a lot of things are going to
mess up her day for long.”

Bartholomew nodded, “Which is why I am
concerned, it is not like her to be gone this long when she is
expecting guests. What could keep a Second away?”

“
Good point,” Hydan said,
accepting another serving of brandy. Then added, “Let’s see if we
can’t lubricate our brains a little and figure this
out!”

“
Lubricate? Don’t you mean
pickle?” I noted.

He shrugged, “You say Potato, I say
Misgruel.”

I had no idea what he meant by
that.

Then he took a sip and used his
snifter to gesture in the air, “Let’s say something has detained
the Albus Second. If this is the case, then it follows that they
would be coming here next, if they are after you.” He pointed at me
with a small gesture of his snifter, causing the liquid inside to
slosh around slightly.

Bartholomew suddenly looked concerned
and started to put down the decanter.

“
Here, give me that,” Hydan
exclaimed, reaching for the crystal decanter, which was still half
filled with brandy.

Bartholomew gave it to him, and then
headed out of the room, I guess to check something, who
knows?

“
So, the question is, do we
stay here and fight them off, which I’m up for, as long as the
brandy holds out, or do we skip town? If we are going to leave,
where would you like to go?”

“
You still want to come
with me? I thought you were here to see the sights?” I
asked.

He shrugged, “I was, but you are far
more entertaining. I’m having a grand time! I’ve met chickens and
had brandy, as well as Saphron. Both were exquisite!”

I nodded, “All right. But I really
don’t have any idea where I should go; I was hoping Fiona could
fill in a lot of the blanks in my mind.”

He nodded, “Indeed, there is this
'thing' she mentioned you purloined. Maybe you wrote it down
somewhere; any idea where to go look for that?”

“
Nope.”

He answered kindly, “Yes, I
understand, your memories are on vacation. But, since you are a
Hidden Soul, I assume you have never met your real
parents?”

“
No, or at least, I don’t
remember if I have.”

He smiled, “Well, there is your quest,
find your parents!”

“
What good would it do to
find them anyway? They didn’t even raise me; from what I
understand, they dumped me on Earth.”

Hydan shrugged, “I was thinking if you
found your parents, perhaps they could help you with your lost
memories. At least one of them has to be a Second, for you to be a
Third. Even though Fiona was unsuccessful, there is nothing like
the bond of your family line. Would it hurt to go see them and find
out?”

“
Just like that, go see
them? I wouldn’t know where to start looking for my real
parents.”

“
Sure you do, just look in
the mirror!”

I frowned, and glanced over the bar to
the mirror behind the bottles, and saw the nautilus Glyph on my
cheek.

“
You mean this Glyph?” I
asked.

“
Of course, it shows your
House, and therefore your World.”

“
House Sivaeral, and what
world are we talking about?”

He smiled, “That would be Abal, in
fact, I just spent a little time there recently, so I kind of know
the ropes, or at least, the best drinking holes!”

I considered it, seeking my birth
parents might help jog my memories, besides, if I’d been sent on a
mission to steal something from The Dragon by my Archimage, perhaps
I should go seek him out. He might also be able to help, and would
be interested in me remembering so he could get to the information
I stole from The Dragon.

Bartholomew came back into the room in
a hurry, and said, “There are some necrosouls searching the
countryside near here, though they haven’t yet penetrated the
glamour.”

“
No doubt they are
searching for you, Nicholas, and if The Dragon really is their
master, he will eventually break through Fiona’s glamour and find
us,” Hydan said.

Bartholomew spoke, “You are under the
protection of the Albus House, so I can’t ask you to leave our
family grounds, but without our Second here, I cannot guarantee
your safety.”

I stood and said, “All right, then I
think it’s best if I leave, that way they have no reason to attack
you.”

Bartholomew shrugged, “Do not fear for
me.”

I nodded, and then turned to Hydan and
said, “All right, Hydan, where to?”

He smiled, tucked the decanter under
his arm, and got ready to burn a pentagram into the floor, but
Bartholomew said, “Here, here, not in the Study! We have a room for
that!”

He led us to a room with a cement
floor; on it were several previous pentagram marks, though they
were just black stains, and did not currently have the active red
flames.

Hydan started making a new pentagram,
and a few minutes later he had his new burning pentagram ready.
This time, I went ahead and jumped in when he told me the Star was
ready to go.

The world spun and blurred again, and
things became lighter. I was standing on a stone floor, and I could
see a setting sun, just off behind a large pyramid. For a moment, I
thought I was back in Egypt, but then I noticed the stairs going up
the center of each pyramid slope, to a raised square top. I
realized this was a Mayan pyramid. Then I recognized Chichen Itza;
I was looking at El Castillo.

Hydan spun into reality a moment later
and staggered out. He took one look around and muttered, “Tarvos
worshipers, ug.” Then he took a big swig from the decanter of
brandy, which he had brought along.

“
Tarvos, what are those,
some kind of demon?

Hydan shrugged, “No, but some of their
practices are borderline. These people learned to sacrifice their
own kind to the Tarvos.”

“
Why would they do that?” I
asked.

“
They mimic their gods, the
Tarvos sacrifice mages of their own kind to their Archimage if they
don’t perform satisfactorily.”

I blinked, “Wow, that’s pretty
barbaric, and likely very motivating to do your best.”

He nodded, “Negative reinforcement, it
does work, but fear is not the best motivator, though it is a
motivator. They are generally an unhappy lot. It’s sad really,
going through life that serious all the time.” He punctuated this
by taking a big swig from the decanter.

I looked around at the ruins and said,
“So why are we here?”

“
We needed a world portal,
and they aren’t easy to construct. It takes a lot of stone to hold
all that power. In fact, now that many stones have been removed
from the Stonehenge site in England, it really only has enough
power to reach a few of the Worlds. However, this place has plenty
of juice left!”

“
So, I take it you can
travel between worlds from Stonehenge?” I asked.

“
Yeah, well, to Abal and a
couple others.”

I nodded, “But here, at Chichen Itza,
there…”

“
Wait, this place is named
‘chicken eats ya’?” he said, his face pulling into a big
grin.

“
No, it’s pronounced
‘chee-chen eet-sah’”.

“
Oh,” he said, sounding
disappointed, but then said, “For a moment there I thought the
Tarvos were developing a sense of humor. I should have known
better.”

I was still turning around, looking at
the various ruin structures. “So, if Stonehenge could take us to
Abal, why didn’t you take us there?”

“
Well, I knew of this place
from a mind image given to me, just like your Stonehenge, so we
could Five Point travel here. I picked this location because they
might be watching Stonehenge, in case you tried to escape that way.
If they got there soon enough after we portaled out, they could
track where we went. They would probably check there because it was
the nearest World Portal system.”

“
Ah,” I said. “And why
would we go to the nearest one if you can teleport anywhere through
one of your Stars?”

“
Well, the further you go,
the more power it draws out of you to form the Star. Most mages
would want to travel to the closest point possible.”

“
Most mages?”

“
I’m extravagant and kind
of attached to my hide. Besides, if we had gotten into an arcane
battle, I might have spilled my brandy!” he said with mock
horror.

He held up the decanter and used it to
point at a structure which was much shorter than El Castillo, “And
speaking of them finding us, perhaps we should wiggle an arm, in
case The Dragon tracks us here.”

“
Wiggle an arm?” I
asked.

He replied, “I like to talk in the
local idiom as much as possible. I did some research before I came
to Earth. You know, get moving fast.”

“
Oh… shake a leg,” I
replied.

“
Yeah, that,” he said with
a grin, and then headed for the structure known as Akab
Dzib.

“
The portals aren’t in El
Castillo?”

“
No, that’s where they did
their big sacrifices; this structure over here has the portal.
Unlike Stonehenge, the Tarvos made just one portal, but they use a
series of glyphs to allow a mage to choose the destination
World.”

I thought about the name Akab Dzib,
and I knew what it actually meant, ‘Dark Writing.’ That sounded
ominous.

Hydan led me around to the southern
end, where there was just one door opening. He led the way inside
to a small chamber. On the opposite wall was another doorway, but
this one had intricately carved glyphs up on the lintel, the very
‘dark writings’ which gave this building its modern name of Akab
Dzib. Under the lintel, in the wide stone doorjamb, was another
carved panel, this one showing a seated figure, surrounded by more
glyphs.

After looking over the glyphs for a
moment, I spoke to Hydan, “So, how do we use it?”

“
The magic only works after
midnight, for what the Terrans would call about one hour. You’ll
know because the glyphs will glow blue at that time if a mage of
sufficient power is near.”

“
There is a legend about
that, I recall,” I said, remembering it as I thought about Acab
Dzib. This is the strange thing about my memory, I could read
ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, and speak various languages, as well
as know local legends and history, but not remember a damn thing
about my own memory. I was beginning to hate magic, and I still
didn’t really believe in it.

“
Oh, what is this legend?”
Hydan asked to while away the time until midnight.

So I told him what I remembered about
the Mayans, and then about this room and these glyphs. “The legend
says they glow at midnight.”

Hydan nodded, “Well, they do, but only
if a mage is present. Of course, everyone is related to mages.
Perhaps someone of sufficient power, say what might be an Eighth,
if there was such a designation, was here at midnight. Maybe they
had just enough power to cause the glyphs to glow. Most legends, on
any planet, come from a basis of reality. Sure, they are often
blown out of proportion, or exaggerated, or changed with repeated
telling, but still, if you go back far enough, and dig deep enough,
something real started them.”

“
How come there aren’t
Eighths?” I asked.

“
Well, there are, we just
don’t call them that. Beyond a Seventh there just isn’t enough
magic to shape reality and make them immortal. They are also not
tied to their Archimages by magic, which is the main reason we cut
off the mage line at the Tier.”

“
What do you mean, ‘tied to
their Archimage’?”

Hydan replied, “Remember when the
Albus Second told you about ending a mage’s line?”

“
Yes, she said all their
descendants will also die.”

He added, “But only down to a Seventh.
This is the primary reason we cut off the title of mage at
Sevenths, beyond there they are not tied to their line by
sufficient magic, though they are certainly related by
blood.”

I nodded; the concept was easy enough
to understand, however believing it… that would take a bit more
evidence. Then I thought of something, “Wait a minute, I’m a Third,
right?”

“
Yep,” he
answered.

“
And you say I’m
immortal?”

He nodded.

“
But, I’m not. You’re just
really saying I don’t age, but I could just drop dead at any moment
if any of my elders die, which means my Second or my
Archimage?”