The Archmage Unbound (15 page)

“Ha! Don’t worry! I’ve been dreaming
about something like this since we were kids,” he reassured me. Long
experience prevented me from being reassured. Dorian drew a dramatic breath.
“The Mystic Guardians of Lothion!” he pronounced, as if he stood upon a stage.

I groaned, “Mystic?”

“Well you are outfitting them each with
magical weapons and armor,” Dorian explained. “Alright how about: The
Defenders of the Flame!”

“What flame?”

“The flame of life that burns in all of
us, we’re supposed to be protecting people from the undead right?”

“I don’t know… I was thinking it should
be something shorter,” I mused. “Let’s think about it a while, there’s no need
to rush into a name yet. Besides, I have a question for you.”

“What about?” Dorian asked.

“I built this armor with you in mind.
Now that you have it, I still feel it isn’t enough. You’ve fought them before,
hand to hand and wearing enchanted armor… what would have helped you most?” I
said, trying to elaborate so that he would understand my question.

My friend pursed his lips for a moment,
concentrating. “What helped most was your father tossing oil on them and
setting them on fire when they had me helpless.”

I smiled ruefully at the thought, “If I
could bring him back to follow us around and haul our asses out of trouble
every time things went badly… I would, and I’d bring your dad back as well.
I’m sure that with the two of them around we could just take it easy from then
on.”

Dorian grinned, but I could see a hint
of sadness in his eyes at the thought. “Well I suppose the next best thing
would be something that would prevent me being borne to the ground and
overwhelmed by sheer numbers. I was always rather jealous of Penny’s strength
when she was your Anath’Meridum. If I had been strong like that they never
could have forced me down.”

I winced, “There’s no way I’m renewing
the bond, with you or anyone else.”

“I understand,” Dorian replied hastily,
“but isn’t there some other way?”

I frowned as I thought… “I don’t know,
maybe. I’ll see what I can figure out.”

The next day I took a break and went out
looking for some privacy. I wanted to talk to Moira again. Finding a quiet
place in the forest I sat down and called her silently. I probably could have
chosen a quiet room in the castle just as easily, but the weather was nice and
it seemed more appropriate to call her in a more natural setting. She appeared
within moments, rising silently from the earth.

“You need me again?” she asked. Today
her eyes were composed of some translucent blue stone, making it look as though
they had clouded over. I wondered if she actually saw through them or if they
were just for show. Each time I called her it seemed her body was created on
the spot from whatever materials were at hand.

“I just wanted to continue our
conversation. I have more questions. You don’t mind do you?” I replied.

“Mind?” Her lips curled into a smirk.
“Remember Mordecai, I am not a living person. I am a memory of a person, I
only exist because your will breathes life into that memory.”

“Well you must have some feelings. You
just smiled at me… and as you’ve shown before you definitely have your own
opinions,” I said in return.

“Do not confuse ‘seeming’ with ‘being’,”
she said. “You might paint a picture of a person, but it still is only oil on
canvas. I am not much more than that.”

“So I am supposed to believe you aren’t
much better than a clockwork mechanism? Do you honestly propose to tell me
that you have no emotions either?” I said bluntly.

She stared at me intently, “No… I do
have emotions… I think. I am as much a victim of the illusion as you are.
While we talk, while you invest your focus on me, I feel… much as I did once,
long ago. But I still remember this is an illusion, as soon as you turn your
will aside I will return to dust.”

“What if I kept my focus on you? It
doesn’t seem to cost me anything. You could live again perhaps…” I suggested.

“No!” she interrupted loudly. “I could
not bear it. The longer I am here, the more I remember, the more it hurts.”

“But you succeeded… I would think
perhaps you would have at least a few good things to remember,” I continued.

“I won,” she agreed, “but that is not
necessarily the same as success. I lost everything I was fighting for, but I
won. Almost everyone I knew or cared about was dead by the time I made my
final choice and the one good reason I had left for fighting was rendered…”
She stopped then and her face told me she had gone further than she intended.

“Forgive me for prying,” I apologized,
but inwardly I wondered what she had been about to say.

“It isn’t your fault. I am not ready to
share the more painful parts of my story yet, but perhaps someday I will.” She
closed her eyes and lowered her head, as if communing with the long dead
spirits of her friends and family.

I waited for a long minute before
continuing, “Actually, I had a more practical reason for disturbing your rest.”

The memory of Moira Centyr opened her
eyes, “Good, my reason for existing is entirely practical. It might be best to
stick to such things.” Staring into those alien stone eyes I could not help
but be touched by the emotion I felt lay behind them, but I kept my tongue
firmly in check this time.

“When Penny and I were bound together,
she gained great physical strength and speed. Cyhan told me it was a side
effect of the bond. Because of it she gained extra strength in proportion to
my power,” I said explaining. “Do you understand how it worked?”

“No. I can guess, but in my time such
bonds were not made. Such a thing would be dangerous for both people involved,
exposing them to pointless risk of life and, as you discovered, limiting the
sensitivity of the mage,” she said. “Why do you ask?”

“I just thought it might be useful for
other warriors to possess such physical advantages, if there were some way to
do it without putting my own life at risk,” even as I spoke it seemed
frivolous. “It’s probably a foolish question isn’t it?”

She laughed showing white pebble teeth
as her mouth opened, “Not at all. You just want to create a
targoth cherek.
” My knowledge of Lycian now was good enough that I already understood the
words, ‘earth guard’, though the context was foreign still.

“I’m not sure what that is,” I admitted.

“That is no surprise,” she said, “There
haven’t been any since the last archmage passed into the earth.”

“You mean yourself?” I asked.

“Yes, Gareth Gaelyn and I were the last
to create such bonds,” she replied.

“So they were men?”

“And women, occasionally. They were
given power to protect their charge.”

“So they were similar to the
Anath’Meridum?” I questioned.

She frowned, the expression seeming
almost completely human despite the exotic composition of her cheeks and lips.
“No, the Anath’Meridum, from what I understand, were created by wizards… after
the sundering. They were an effort to appease the church and the people of the
time I do not doubt. Very likely they were inspired by the memory of the
targoth cherek.”

She paused for a moment before
elaborating. “Despite the superficial similarities they were entirely
different than your pact-bearers. Each targoth cherek was given his or her
power to protect an archmage. They served as bodyguards, rather than
executioners.”

I couldn’t help but interrupt, “Were
their lives connected to the archmage they served?”

Moira snorted, which seemed odd given
her form. “Absolutely not, they were connected to the
earth
not another
human being. We weren’t stupid enough to link two people’s lives in such a
foolish manner.”

“Why weren’t there any more created
after the war with Balinthor?”

“There weren’t any archmages,” she said
matter-of-factly. “The creation of the Anath’Meridum made sure of that.”

“So only…,” I began.

“Yes, only an archmage could facilitate
the bond between a mortal being and the earth,” she said answering my
unfinished question.

“Hmmm,” I said sagely as I considered her
words.

“You don’t understand why, do you?” she
asked pointedly.

“No,” I admitted.

“Any such bond, such as the bond you
took with your wife, is a bond between two mutually consenting beings. It
cannot be forced. A wizard is unable to communicate with the earth… and for
that matter so is everyone else. An archmage must facilitate, must communicate
with the earth or no such bond can be formed,” she explained.

I was beginning to get the general idea,
but I still had many questions. “Were the ‘miellte’ you mentioned before, the
watchers, were they also ‘targoth cherek’?” I was referring to the watchers
that observed archmages to keep them from overusing their powers.

Moira laughed, “No… that would be
pointless. The ‘miellte’ were wizards themselves and such a bond would have
limited their ability to listen, to communicate, just as your pact kept you
from hearing the earth. A bond with the earth, or anything else, would keep
the miellte from hearing the mind of the archmage they were tasked with
watching.”

Now that she said it aloud it made more
sense to me. “So the targoth cherek were created as guardians?”

“Of a sort,” she replied. “They were
almost exclusively bodyguards for the one or two archmages alive at any given
time.”

It was time to get down to brass tacks.
It sounded as if the earth-bond she was describing might be perfect for my
purpose but I needed to know what its effects were, as well as how to create
it. “So to be more specific, is there a limit to how many of these earth-bonds
an archmage can create, and what are the drawbacks?” Experience had taught me
that there had to be problems.

Her eyebrows, or what passed for
eyebrows anyway… shot up in surprise. “You would attempt something like that?
You have barely begun to learn to control your ability.”

“My life, since learning of my magical
gifts, has been rough. The only thing I am sure of is that I rarely have as
much time as I should. If I don’t move forward I will be caught by my enemies
before I have learned how to deal with them,” I told her.

“You just slew an army of over thirty
thousand men, how many enemies could you have left?” she asked, but there was
more than a question in her eyes, there was a challenge there as well.

“More than when I started. Those men
were never my enemies; my true enemy was always the dark god behind them,
Mal’goroth. Since I stopped them he is only stronger and the shiggreth he
created are loose upon the land. Even now they are multiplying somewhere that
I cannot see them,” I replied.

“Are those your only enemies?”

Her question gave voice to my fear and
suddenly I knew for a fact that my paranoia must be correct. “No, there are
others. The other dark gods certainly, and I suspect the shining gods are
worse than neutral; they may actually be malign as well. Beyond that I have no
idea, but I must assume I have a growing crowd of ‘admirers’ among my own kind
as well.”

She nodded her head in agreement, “You
are right to fear the shining gods. They may be your greatest foes. Whether
they are malign to humanity I do not know, but they certainly bear you no good
will.”

Her statement reminded me of my recent
run-in at the royal palace. “I spoke with Celior not long ago. He said
something I didn’t understand.”

“It is rare that they say anything worth
hearing,” she commented.

“He said that I bore ‘Illeniel’s Doom’
and that I should die before destroying us all,” I told her. “Have you heard
of it before?”

She sat for a long time and I almost
gave up on her answering. “I have heard of it. My Mordecai, the one that died
long ago, mentioned it once,” she said. Her expression had grown distant, as
if she was remembering times and places far removed from the present. I
suppose she must have been thinking of her lover, the Illeniel she had known in
her time that had born my name. At last she stared at me again, “I do not know
what he meant. It was related to some sort of secret your family kept. All he
would tell me was that it was an old family shame, something that went back to
the founder, the first Illeniel.”

That’s just what I need,
more secrets,
I thought quietly to
myself. “How will I find out?” I said aloud, more to myself than to her.

“That’s for you to figure out. Perhaps
you will never know, though if it were that important I would think your family
might have kept some sort of record,” she said.

“Perhaps in my father’s house,” I said,
thinking aloud. There was still a lot that needed exploring there. I had
barely begun to scratch the surface of the books there. In fact I had only
read four of the books from my father’s library so far… one of history, one
regarding teleportation circles and a couple relating to the use of illusions.
Those last two I was still coming to grips with. I shook my head and spoke
again, “You’ve let me get sidetracked. I wanted to know about the limitations
and drawbacks involved with the targoth cherek.”