The Powterosian War (Book 5) (22 page)

“I tell you Twiddle, this is a great library. I see from what I’ve read so far, I’ve not kept up since undertaking Saxthor’s care and mentoring. I’m just not sure my wizardry skills are up to assisting the king.” Tournak scanned through the manuscript at hand then released the scroll to roll up.

“Saxthor wants me to read the energy fields, but unless they’re close by, I don’t have a strong enough grasp on the gradients. I must find something in these volumes to strengthen my own powers and their connection to the fields.”

Tournak fingered through the scrolls on the four large shelves atop the large bookcase. Frustrated, he opened the cabinet doors at the case’s base, but none of the musty scrolls and boxes of meaningless junk caught his attention either. In his search, he pulled out the scrolls from the central cabinet bay, checking for anything among them of interest.

Twiddle darted in hopping over the contents, checking every angle. He pecked at the back of the cabinet where Tournak happened to notice a slight indention in the wall. It wasn’t much; at first, it seemed like a flaw in the wood, but then it did look intentionally made. The wizard used a staff to lever the great bookcase away from the wall but there was no secret opening behind the case. He scratched his head in bewilderment, decided it was nothing after all and continued his search through the bookcase. Yet there was that delicate, almost imperceptible tingle of energy radiating from the back of the cabinet. It was so slight that a non-wizard would never notice it. Perhaps it was nothing.

As Tournak looked again, checking the cabinet base, he noticed a spell written under the first shelf, not visible when standing.

“That’s odd,” he mumbled and gently brushed Twiddle out of the way. The wren dropped his calling card and flew back up to nap. “The spell has no indications of standing positions, voice inflection, or other notations of a complex or dangerous spell. Wonder why the wizard wrote it here? Chanting unknown spells is a dangerous business; that’s the first warning wizard trainees get. Yet this seems innocuous enough.” He thought of the finger indention in the bookcase’s back board. “No, they’re not connected.” He puzzled for a moment and decided just to speak the spell and see what happened.

As Tournak enunciated the incantation he felt an energy sensation but saw nothing happen. He looked around the room, but nothing was changed. Must have been something to do with something the old wizard was making at the time, he thought. I’ll have another look at that finger indentation in the board below just in case. Tournak got back down on his knees and, moving the scrolls aside, flicked a finger torch to look into the back of the cabinet. He saw a faint line around the finger indentation.

“It wasn’t there before.” He looked at Twiddle, head tucked under his wing, ignoring him. His heart skipped a beat. He reached back into the cabinet and pressed the indentation. A thin layer, barely more than a veneer leaf, slid back to reveal a parchment sheet with charred edges hidden within the board.

Tournak pulled out the old document and immediately saw the signature and seal of the Wizards’ Hall’s last great High Wizard! He dropped the parchment as if it burned him, so powerful was the wizard’s name.

“The last High Wizard left the continent at the conclusion of the third and last Wizard War, eons ago,” he said, staring at the parchment on the floor. “He was famous in wizard lore, his power the greatest even among the other wizards. I’ve never seen any document with his name on it, though Memlatec showed me the signature late in my training. I remember it. This paper came from the Wizard’s Hall and belonged to and was protected by that wizard lord.” Tournak picked up the parchment with reverence. “What could this be doing here?” Twiddle’s head popped up staring at the document, too.

Tournak read it with care. He recognized the incantation referenced the planetary energy gradients, but it was written in some code he only partially knew. He had to crack it, it did reference the energy gradients which he could make out. Then there were the codes above various words indicating voice inflections required for certain words and others to indicate directions to face and such that showed the incantation to be both delicate and extremely powerful.

“This could be very dangerous if spoken incorrectly,” he mumbled. Suddenly Twiddle was bobbing on his shoulder. “See that dragon icon stamped prominently on the document in three places?” he asked Twiddle. “That’s a primal warning.” Tournak turned again to the wren.

“Where would the Hoya’s wizard have gotten such a document? Memlatec never mentioned the wizard of Hoya. He couldn’t have been famous or that powerful. How would he have gotten his hands on a page or scroll from the high wizard? This should never have left the high wizard’s possession and certainly not the Wizards’ Hall. Never mind that; these are dangerous times, and it does reference the energy gradients.”

Tournak’s elfin heritage made him sensitive to any magic’s energy. His wizard’s training made him more so, such that when he passed his hand over the parchment he sensed the hint of energy indicating the spell’s latent power.

“Well if there was ever a time to take the chance, I guess this is it.”

Twiddle seemed to sense something. Perhaps birds’ sensitivities recognized energies as well. For whatever reason, the wren flew to Tournak’s hand and looked over the spell as if detecting something there, that Tournak was about to release it.

“This will be dangerous, Twiddle. You should fly out on the window ledge to be safe, just in case.” The wren refused to move and when brushed off Tournak’s hand, he merely flew up on the wizard’s shoulder. “Very well then, but we may both face something from another plane, something threatening.” Twiddle’s bobbing intensified, staring at the parchment. “Your kind is always nosy and impatient.”

As a fairly powerful wizard, trained by Memlatec himself, Tournak knew the codes on the parchment above and below the spell words and positioned himself facing east in the center of the room. Following the codes and making certain assumptions about the elements he didn’t know, he chanted the spell just so after studying all the inflection codes. He wanted to ensure he made no mistake that might release a protective entity set in the spell to destroy anyone using it incorrectly.

As cast, the parchment sizzled with energy that shot through the wizard and Twiddle too. Tournak’s hair stood on end. He felt tingly all over as the immediate numbness subsided. His awareness, first of colors, then everything around him, intensified. A holographic image of a ball with a landscape pictured and lines of a graph overlaying the scene appeared before him in the air. Tournak moved his hand toward the ball and the ball rotated, following his finger, with the place on the translucent map following his finger’s movement.

“It’s a map with graph lines on it,” Tournak said. Twiddle couldn’t understand that, but he was fixated on the image. As the wizard moved his finger before the ball, the place noted blew up in image for closer detail. “This is where we are now; it’s the Hoyahof here at the center.” He moved his finger left and right then up and the image blew up Lake Pundar on the map. “It’s a map of the lands surrounding the source, which must be grounded in the parchment. These graph lines, they’re the planetary energy gradients!”

When he moved his finger close to the lower southeast edge of the ball, the limit of the spell’s perception from Hoya, there the energy gradient warped and glowed a pale red. To test out his theory, he moved his finger to the lowest quadrant and as expected, there, where the lines north and south crossed stood the exact location of the Sentinel Pine that Tournak knew well. It was where wizards had hidden Saxthor’s Sorblade until he came to claim it.

“But look here,” the wizard said to Twiddle. “There’s a warp here just at the southern edge of the ball, the limit of the spell’s visibility. There’s a very powerful upwelling of the gradients in the mountain’s, along the Neuyokkasin border with the empire. That must be about where that old Occintoc fortress stood. Memlatec showed me the ruins on a map long ago.” He looked back at the inflamed warping of the gradient in the area north of Heedra in the southern Sengenwhan swamps.

“This must indicate where Dreaddrac’s evil is concentrating. The vile negativity is interfering with the energy gradient. Yes, and look here at Graushdem, the red warping is even more pronounced there.

“The inflamed areas must indicate negative energy. The Sentinel Pine is showing, but it’s pale blue, perhaps indicating a powerful positive or natural tapping or upwelling near the surface. And I can well guess what these two blue thicknesses indicate. But that spot on the border is yellowish, what does it mean?”

Puzzled, but having observed all the areas represented, Tournak waved his hand over the holographic image, and the ball faded and disappeared. He returned the parchment to its hiding place and closed the veneer cover. Instantly the line in the wood disappeared. With Twiddle on his shoulder, Tournak left the tower to find Saxthor.

What does the yellow at the border intersection indicate? He wondered. He passed a guard running down the hall and found Saxthor with Bodrin very agitated in the royal apartments.

*

“Tournak, have you discovered something?” Saxthor asked, as the wizard entered.

“The Dreaddrac forces are massing across the Nhy in the Sengenwhan swamps. They must have at least one wizard or wraith with them to show such an inflamed presence,” Tournak announced on entering.

“How’d you discover that?” Saxthor asked.

“With all due respect, Your Majesty, don’t ask.”

“You’re quite sure?” Bodrin asked. “That confirms what I suspected and what General Socockensmek’s reports warn.”

“You show up here in Hoya, Saxthor and the crown in Konnotan.”

“Indeed.”

“Yes, and there’s some upwelling of energy on the Neuyokkasin border with the empire,” Tournak said. “I don’t understand the meaning of it, but it’s there.”

“Show me on the map,” Saxthor said, rising, going to the desk and unrolling a scroll.

“Here,” Tournak pointed out.

“I think I remember hearing about an old abandoned fortress near there,” Saxthor said. “Remember, Bodrin? Memlatec told us about it in one of his stories when we were children. It’s the ruins of some old Occintoc fortress or something like that, wasn’t it? Never approach that place,” he said, his voice deep, mimicking Memlatec’s warning, then grinned. His grin melted away when he looked again at Tournak.

Bodrin came to the map and nodded agreement.

What’s the significance of that?” Saxthor asked.

“I don’t know yet,” Tournak said, shrugging his shoulders.

“And the Grand Imperial Army, does your new source say anything about that?”

“My new source can’t reach that far from here.”

“Bodrin, see to the horses. Be sure they are well fed and rested this night.” Saxthor said. Bodrin nodded and was about to head out the door when Belnik came in.

“I know you are exhausted,” Belnik said, with a tray in hand. “I knew Bodrin would need this food even if Your Majesty and the wizard don’t.”

“He’s got to go take care of the horses,” Saxthor said.

“It can wait long enough for me to get a snack, can’t it?” Bodrin was inspecting the tray. “We’re not leaving until the morning.”

Before Saxthor could respond, the three men looked up, hearing footsteps in the hall.

“Sekkarian?” Bodrin suggested. Twiddle flew outside the door, turned in midair and flew back inside, this time to Saxthor’s shoulder.

“Let’s hope so,” Saxthor responded. “Twiddle’s behavior doesn’t indicate danger, but someone is very excited.” Delia rose from under a table and came to sit beside Saxthor. Her tongue panted and her tail wagged as she stared at the door.

Tonelia appeared suddenly in the doorway though the guards tried to stop her. She spread her stance, slapped hands on her hips, and stared defiantly at the men before her. Her long black hair was slightly disheveled from her ride, but her brilliant blue, animated eyes were luminous.

When the two flushed guards bowed to the king and took her by the arms, she jerked free. “Take your hands off me!” she said and looked at Bodrin and Saxthor. “I didn’t come all this way to be treated like a criminal.”

“Release the countess,” Saxthor said, nodding to the guards, who left to resume their positions at the top of the staircase down the hall.

“What are you doing here?” Bodrin asked. He dropped the plump drumstick he was holding. “I told you to remain at Vicksylva.”

“Yeah, well, you told me a lot of things, but I’m here to be with you in this war. I’m not going to sit home knitting while you risk your life at the front. Whatever happens is going to happen to both of us.”

“Tonelia, don’t talk to me like that,” Bodrin said, flushing. He glanced at Saxthor, who couldn’t resist grinning. Tonelia walked over, picked up the drumstick, and put it in the trash shaking her head. She grabbed her husband and, wrapping her arms around him, planted a kiss that seemed unending.

He staggered to straighten up. “You’re a bad wife.” Bodrin looked at Saxthor when Tonelia looked at him.

“Don’t get me involved,” Saxthor said.

“Come along, Tonelia, “Bodrin said, grabbing the other drumstick from the tray. He started for the door with Tonelia in tow, flashing a smile at Saxthor.

“Excuse me, Your Majesty,” Tonelia said with a slight bow. She patted Delia, who’d come up to greet her as she departed.