The Scofflaw Magician (The Artifactor Book 3) (8 page)

Paying no heed
once that command was given, she deactivated the spell on the tube and drew out
the portrait. Carefully unrolling it, she set it to a thin, wooden art board,
securing the top and bottom in place with leather straps.

“
Sevana?”
Master’s creaking voice called. “
Did you call me and then forget you had?”

“No, I’m just
trying to do three things at once.” Turning back, she braced her hands against
the top of the table, leaning in at the waist to put her head at eye level with
the small sculpture. “Master. You’re not going to believe me, I barely believe
me, but I just found a portrait that bears all of the traits and power that a
word from the Book of Truth would have.”

Master’s mouth
dropped open. “
WHAT
!?”

“That’s exactly
how I feel about it.”

“
Let me see,
”
he demanded.

Picking up the
figurine, she turned it around so that he could see the portrait, now leaning
against the wall.

Master took one
look and started doing some very creative swearing. “
How is that possible?
How is that POSSIBLE? Is it the paper or the ink that’s reading out levels like
this
?”

“I’m not sure
at the moment,” Sevana admitted. “I was using my box lens when I first took the
readings, and it can’t clarify things on quite that level yet.”

“
Well,
sweetling, what’s stopping you now? Run those scans
!”

“Bossy thing,
aren’t you?” Sevana was already setting the Caller back on the table before he
could get the words out. He was impatient, as she was, to know what was going
on, but the banter between them was so easy and familiar that it gave her a much
needed grounding. Seeing that portrait had sent her world spiraling. Sevana
needed a dose of the known to help steady her.

She picked up
her most sensitive diagnostic wand and an empty leather-bound journal, and
started examining the portrait in fine detail. As the spell ran, she asked him,
“Have you ever seen anything like this before?”

“
No, I
certainly haven’t. How did you run across this anyway
?”

“The youngest
princess of Sa Kao went missing a few weeks ago. They assumed she was spirited
away. I volunteered to help—”

“
Wait now,
you volunteered? That’s rare of you.
”

“It was either
that or watch them start a war with the Fae.”

Master paused,
eyeing her suspiciously. “
I have a sense you’re leaving out a lot of
details, sweetling.
”

“I am,” she
admitted frankly. “I’ll tell you the full story some other time. The main point
is, I haven’t been able to locate the princess, and while I was searching for
her, I ran across a case of another young man that disappeared the same way.
This portrait is of him and was hanging in his home. I’m told that the man that
painted him also painted the princess in the same way.”

Master
grimaced, face screwing up. “
Seems too much to be a coincidence.
”

“I agree. I’m
having them search for her portrait now.” Her diagnostic wand went still, the
spell fading as the analysis completed, and she lifted the journal and flipped
it back to the beginning. “Spell’s a level twelve in power. It’s made of
rainbow mist, piece of a fallen star, and…” her tongue tripped over itself and
her eyes crossed. Sevana had to blink to focus, sure she wasn’t reading this
right. “A word from the Book of Truth? But there are no words on here, except
the boy’s name!”

“
Sevana,
this is important,
” Master’s voice was serious, and hoarse with some
emotion she didn’t want to put a name to. “
Tell me about the paper. Is it
the paper that’s part of the spell
?”

Sevana had to
flip the page and scan to find that answer. “No. The paper seems to be normal.
It’s made of wood pulp, water plant, and fiber. Only the ink has any power to
it. But Master, I swear to you, the only words on here are the boy’s
name—although that’s spelled backwards for some strange reason—and there’s
nothing camouflaged here. There are no hidden words I can detect.”

Master put both
hands over his face as if he wanted to cry, or perhaps scream, his whole
posture sinking into himself. “
Sweetling. It’s not that there’s a word from
the Book of Truth on there. It’s just that your wand is only set to detect it
in that form. The ink is the same as what was used to write the Book of Truth.
”

She felt an icy
chillness rush through her veins as her brain cottoned onto his meaning. “You
told me once that the Book of Truth was a normal book until someone wrote into
it. You mean it was the ink itself that gave it all of its power?”

“
Yes,
precisely.
”

Spluttering,
she objected, “But no one is able to create an element all by itself that has a
power level of seven! It’s beyond human ability.”

Master lowered
his hands, smile crooked. “
It’s the Fae that crafted the ink, sweetling.
”

Her knees gave
out, sending her straight to the floor. Sevana sat there, legs sprawling out in
odd directions, gaping at him. “Tell me you’re joking.”

“
It’s not a
well-known fact, but I’m old enough to remember it happening. It was a gesture
of good will from the Fae, that they gave us the ink so we could write the Book
of Truth.
”

Sevana
remembered the history well enough. Four of the great kings, the ones that had
drafted the first lasting peace treaty in the world, gathered together in a
council and wanted to write down the truths they had learned on how to be a
good ruler. The whole world thought it a splendid idea at the time, as it was
the only peace they had known in their lifetimes, and there was much support for
the project. The kings spent nearly a decade creating drafts, sending versions
of it back and forth between each other, before they finally settled on a
version. They then set a scribe to write it, which he did for the next year,
each word being more drawn than written. Once it was finished, it glowed with
such intense magical power that it had become an elemental source for
magicians.

“The
Fae
gave us the ink?!”

“
Part of the
treaty the Four Kings established gave them peace in their own lands, with set
boundaries that humans were not allowed to enter. It gave the Fae peace of
mind. They repaid it by helping to craft the Book of Truth,
” Master
explained. “
Mind, I was only a youngster myself while the book was being
written, so I don’t have the facts straight on how it all came to be. I just
remember hearing about it from my own Master.
”

Sevana sent a
prayer up to heaven that Master was as ancient as the hills. It was only his
memory of events that saved her sometimes. “Well, that is understandable, but I
highly doubt the Fae gave ink to some evil magician so he could use it to
spirit people away. So how did a human craft this?”

“
It’s not
possible to do so, sweetling. Not so precisely that even a diagnostic wand would
be fooled into thinking it was the same thing. No, I think someone stole ink
from the Fae.
”

“Master, that’s
even less possible,” she objected. “Do you know how hard it is to enter Fae
territory without being spotted? Even Baby can’t manage it.”

“
It’s the
only possibility,
”
he insisted. “
No human can craft this. We
don’t even know how the Fae make it.
”

Well, that part
was more of a given. The Fae were not known to give up their secrets. “What do
you suggest I do? I can’t begin to unravel how to get this boy out of the
portrait until I know how this spell worked. And knowing how the ink was made
plays a very large part in that.”

“
You’ve
created closer bonds with the Fae than any other human I know of. Ask them for
help.
”

True, she had,
but she didn’t think their bond was strong enough for her to be begging for
favors, either.

Seeing the
doubt on her face, he gave her an encouraging nod. “
They’ll want to know
that their ink is being used for evil. Trust me. Tell them. They’ll help if for
no other reason than to stop the man from abusing their work.
”

He might have a
very good point there. “I’ll try, at least.”

Master glanced
over his shoulder, another voice that was muted and garbled in the background.
“
I’m in the middle of something serious too, sweetling, otherwise I’d help
more. But there’s something going wrong in Belen with the royal family, and
they’re calling for me. I’ll talk to you again, later, when I have a moment to
spare. But keep me updated as you can. This is too serious for you to handle
alone.
”

Sevana was
inclined to agree, although she wasn’t about to say that out loud. “You’ve
helped me plenty. Go, go.”

Reluctantly, he
did so. When the Caller went still, she stared hard at the portrait for a long
moment. So, she had to go asking for help from the Fae, eh? That wouldn’t go
over well.

But before she
did that, she might as well go and talk to the royal family here. There was
still at least one portrait to be found, after all.

Malia stared at
her with horror, a hand over her mouth. “There’s
more
?”

Sevana sat at
what was becoming her customary place at the low table with both royal parents,
Farah, and the only other child still living at home—Xinon, the youngest
prince. He was twelve, and at that awkward stage where he was old enough to
understand what was going on but powerless to do anything about it. Sevana saw
him sneak closer and closer to his older sister for comfort as Sevana explained
things.

“I know there’s
at least one more—I suspect it’s not the only one,” Sevana clarified. “Firuz,
you said to me the first day that there were reports of other people missing.
How many?”

Firuz’s face
was ashen and he had to start twice before the words would leave his mouth. “I
don’t remember the exact number. Higher than usual, which is why it attracted
my attention. I’ll get the report for you.”

“That will
help, yes.” A part of Sevana wanted to end her report there so she could crawl
into bed. She desperately needed the sleep. But there were still things to set
in motion before she could follow the selfish impulse. “I need you to search
for any ink drawings. He took your daughter’s portrait with him, correct? Yes,
I suspected as much. But he left the boy’s behind, and he might have done that
with others. Some of them might have even been traded on the market.
Regardless, I need them all to be found.”

It was Farah
that dared to ask what her parents could not. “How many do you think we’ll
find?”

Sevana put two
fingers in the corners of her eyes and pressed hard, trying to stay awake and
alert to answer all of these questions. “When I make something, I usually go
through about a dozen trials before I have a working model.”

“A dozen,”
Firuz repeated hoarsely, his tone hollow.

“Let’s hope he
didn’t have to try that many times before he got it to work. For one thing, it
might be impossible to track that many down. Firuz, with your permission, I
want to bring in my business partner. Kip’s used to tasks like this, he has
many contacts, and a good idea of what to look for.”

Firuz nodded
instantly. “Of course. Do whatever you need to.”

“Also, I’ve
spoken with my master about this case, and he’s requested to be kept in the
loop. I’ll be borrowing his help heavily to unravel this.”

“This
is…complicated enough to require his help?” Malia asked in a trembling voice.

Sevana eyed
her. The woman looked like she was ready to pass out any moment. Was it really
wise to explain everything that she knew at this point? And how would they take
the knowledge that part of this hideous magic was Fae ink? No, better not to
mention that. They’d go to battle with the Fae again over another
misunderstanding and Sevana didn’t have the energy or inclination to stop them
a second time.

“Complicated is
not quite the right word. It’s just very, very strange. We’ve never seen
anything like this before. We’re trying to figure out how exactly it was done.
If I can backwards engineer this, then I can undo it.”

“You can do
that.” Firuz’s expression made this a question instead of a command.

“I can,” she
agreed easily. “The process of figuring out a spell isn’t new to me, I do that
all of the time; it’s just the setup that’s throwing me off. Once I figure it
out, we’ll be fine. Firuz, Malia, I will work here for a while longer and try
to sort out as much as I can, but I must tell you I can’t do all of my work
from here.”

Both parents
looked panicked by this.

Sevana held up
a hand, delaying their protests. “There are certain…elements…from Noppers Woods
that will help me get to the bottom of this. And there are a few experts I’d
like to talk to as well that I can’t easily contact. I have to go to them if I
want to speak with them. I will stay here for a few more days, see how many
portraits that we can find, because the more they have to look at, the better.
But I can’t delay for long. I have a bad feeling I’m racing against time.”

“The more time
you give that magician, the better he can hide himself.” Farah looked at her
squarely. “Is that what you mean?”

“Yes. I don’t
want this man getting away, do you?”

Every person at
the table spoke at once, vehemently. “No.”

Sevana gave
them a wolfish smile. “I thought not. Firuz, one more thing. I want a
description of the painter. He might well have been in disguise, but I want one
anyway. We have nothing to go off of right now.”

“Consider it
done,” he promised. “Do you still need Xald?”

She pondered
that for a moment. “I don’t believe so. But I’ll tell you if that changes.” She
ran through a mental checklist but couldn’t think of anything else to discuss.
“I think that’s it. Now, I need sleep.”

“I’ll show you
to a room.”

“I’ll do it,
Father,” Farah volunteered. “Come this way, Artifactor.”

Sevana
gratefully did just that.

~ ~ ~

After several
nights of having basically no sleep, Sevana completely collapsed that night. Farah
had her escorted to a very nice guest room, but the details were fuzzy on what
it looked like, as she had only focused on the fluffy bed in the middle of it.
The mattress swallowed her whole as soon as she landed on it and Sevana didn’t
even get her head onto a pillow before her brain shut off completely.

She was likely
comatose for several hours (possibly days) before Grydon woke her up. His
method of doing so was to pounce on the bed and then sprawl over her back. This
not only suffocated her, but cut off any attempts of her fighting back until
she was awake enough to negotiate with him. The wolf had learned after his
first attempt at getting her out of bed. He never gave her leverage after that.

This time,
though, he had one of her inventions in his mouth, dangling off to the side.
Sevana thought of it as a mini-Caller, as it was made of the same stone and
spell elements, but with enough tweaks to it so that it worked for the non-magical.
At least for a time. Until the magic in it ran out and it went back to being
stone. She was still working on it, trying to make it viable for the public at
large.

“
Grydon, did
you take me to Sevana
?”

Morgan. She
rolled her eyes. “Kip, I sent you a message last night so you wouldn’t disrupt
me.”

He puzzled on
this for a moment. “
You sound like you just woke up. It’s the middle of the
day, why aren’t you awake and moving already
?”

“Because I’ve
been working on this case for several days with no rest? Any other stupid
questions you want to ask me?”

She could hear
the grin in his voice as he asked, “
What are you wearing
?”

Why would he
even care? “The scalps of men that annoyed me when I was trying to sleep.”

“
Allow me to
rephrase. Are you decent? By Sa Kaon standards
?”

Ah, that was
what he was worrying about. “No. I will not allow you. Allowing you means you
can interrupt me while sleeping, and that I will not allow.”

“
Sevana.”
Her name resounded with forced patience.

“Argh, fine.
What? What is so important that you’d call me and use up your precious magic in
the mini-Caller?”

“
Your
instructions are impossible. Or I should say, the instruction to go find
portraits is perfectly reasonable, but your description of what I’m looking for
is too short on details. Do you know how many ink portraits are on the market?
This is the definition of looking for a needle in a haystack.
”

Sevana
negotiated getting a wolf off her back, squinting as she tried to remember what
she had written to him last night. She remembered shooting off a quick message
to Morgan, asking him to hunt down the ink portraits using his contacts, but
only in the most vague way. What had she said? It escaped her and she gave up
on trying to recall. “Fine. What do you want, a more accurate description?”

“
I want to
actually look at the portrait. If I can see it with my own eyes, I’ll be able
to recognize the artist’s style.
”

“That might be
impossible. In the immediate sense. I am not willing to take that thing through
a clock portal. I don’t know what it’ll do to the person trapped in the
painting.”

“
It’s that
unstable
?” Morgan responded, startled.

“No, I think it’s
very stable, I just don’t trust evil magicians. Right now, I’m not willing to
take risks with people’s lives. I’m not taking that portrait to you. If you
want to see it, you’ll have to come here.”

“
Sev,
”
he said slowly, as if spelling something out to a young child, “
the only
way for me to do that quickly is to use one of your clocks.
”

“I’m
sleep-deprived, not an idiot. That’s what I’m telling you to do.”

“
Didn’t you
say that you’d sell me to trolls for soup stock if you ever caught me in your
clock room again
?”

“You had just
scraped the clock and almost gotten yourself lodged in a magical no-man zone,
how did you expect me to react?” That had been one of the most heart-stopping
moments of her life. Sevana had been convinced, for a split second, that she had
killed her best friend. Again. Only this time, she might not have been able to
bring him back to life. It had taken two months before she had even let him
back in Big unsupervised, it had scared her so badly. “Don’t bring anything
with you, not even a bag, and DON’T, for the love of mercy, don’t jostle the
pendulum.”

“
You think
I’m going to risk going through that again
?” Morgan tried to make his voice
flippant, but missed, as the memory was still fresh enough in his mind to make
his words shake. “
Believe me, I’ll be careful. The clock is running, I
assume.
”

“You assume
correctly. Get over here.”

“
Coming. Oh,
and get dressed before leaving the room. I’d avoid shocking your guests.
”

“I can’t traipse
through the halls in nothing but a shift?” she drawled. “Imagine that.”

“
Sev.
Behave.
”

It was her turn
to grin as she proclaimed, “Never.”

Laughing, he
promised, “
Be there soon.
”

“Fine, fine.”
The mini-Caller went silent and she rolled out of the bed, feeling a decade
older. Hopefully clean clothes and some food would wake her up enough to answer
the multitude of questions that Morgan surely had for her. 

 ~ ~ ~

By the time she
made it into the workroom, Morgan was already there, sitting on a windowsill
and looking out over the garden. He seemed none the worse for wear from the
trip, every hair in place and immaculately dressed as usual. Sevana did note in
amusement that he was carefully positioned away from everything that was even
remotely magical. Being in her workrooms, no matter how temporary, had
engrained caution into his very bones.

She wasn’t
about to dissuade this. It let him live longer.

Morgan must
have heard her come in, as he shifted so that he could face her. “Morning?”

“Afternoon,
more like.”

He pointed to a
tray sitting on a corner table. “I had them bring something up for you.”

“Bless you.”
Sevana headed straight for it, poured herself a cup of hot tea, and drained it.
Only then did she feel more alive. Mercy, but she had to stop doing these
all-nighters. They aged her a decade.

Pointing at the
portrait, Morgan said, “I assume that’s the one you were talking about.”

“That’s it.”
Pouring herself another cup, Sevana snagged something that looked like flat
bread wrapped around sliced fruit. Biting into it, she found it to be sweetly
delicious. Now where had this been on the breakfast menu the past week she’d
been here? “What do you think?”

“Slightly
amateurish, but well done. I would say not a professional painter by any means,
but someone who could scrape out a living with those skills.” Standing, he
crossed to it, and leaned in slightly to get a better look. His arms were
carefully crossed behind his back to avoid any accidental brushes, which Sevana
appreciated. She herself wasn’t really keen on touching it. “His shading is
subtly off, but the proportions are good, as is the composition. The thing that
puzzles me is, why is the name spelt backwards?”

“I’ve been
wondering that ever since I saw it,” Sevana sighed before popping the last of
her breakfast into her mouth. “I’ll welcome a good theory on that.”

“None to offer,
sorry. But what’s your working theory?”

Sevana gripped
the back of her neck, kneading out a kink there. “Not sure I have one. Here’s
what I know: people are disappearing, there are portraits of the missing
people, an evil magician is responsible for it.”

Rubbing at his
jaw, he gave her a funny look. “I thought you were just being cryptic in your
note, but is that really all you have to go on?”